William Gilbard alias Higges signed the Register pages till July 1610, and he may have superintended them till May 1611, when the page was signed once by John Rogers, Vicar. In that year the curate, William Gilbert alias Higgs, died, and, strange to say, was buried the very day before Gilbert Shakespeare, i.e., on 2nd February 1611-2.
Does this imply that the clerk was left to his own classic inspirations or memories in writing the register, or that his superintendence was taken over by the succeeding assistant minister, Edward Woolmer? Under him the language of the text gradually simplified, until it took on a new varnish of Latin under Mr. Richard Watts.
But the fact remains, that “adolescens,” which had only once appeared before, never appears again, and it is difficult to gauge the extent of its meaning and use. It has been held by all writers to support Halliwell-Phillipps’ statement that the poet’s brother went to settle as a haberdasher in St. Bride’s, London, and lived to a great age. I have definitely proved that Halliwell-Phillips was mistaken in saying that Gilbert was a London haberdasher (see my article in the “Athenæum,” 29th December 1900, “John Shakespeare of Ingon, and Gilbert of St. Brides”), p. 62. The whole arguments of the family-wills tell against the notion of the survival of the poet’s brother, and my careful study in registers helps to convince me that the word “adolescens” is not here used in its normal and natural sense.
That should be “a youth” or “junior.” In either case if this is accepted as true of some unknown nephew of the poet, it would imply that Gilbert Shakespeare married somewhere, baptized this child somewhere, and died somewhere, and that the mother died somewhere, none of these facts having yet been proved. If it had its ordinary meaning, it would suggest that the father and mother were already dead, and the “youth” stood alone in the world. But if so, where was Gilbert buried? The name of Shakespeare would have been sure to have been noticed, either in London or in country registers.
The difficulties seem to me so great,[111] that the alternative seems a trifling one in comparison, that the word, for some inexplicable reason, has been unintelligently applied to the poet’s brother Gilbert. In this opinion I have taken much counsel from students of registers, and they agree that it is the most natural explanation of the puzzle. And therefore I believe firmly that Gilbert Shakespeare, the poet’s brother, died and was buried at the date recorded in the register (Feb. 3, 1611-2), which accounts for his not being mentioned in the poet’s will.
“Sonderabdruck aus dem Archiv für das Studium der Neueren Sprachen und Literaturen,” Band cxxiii, Heft 1-2, 1909.
Note to Article XI (1)
WILLIAM COMBE AND THE PROPOSED WELCOMBE ENCLOSURES, 1614-19
The story of the attempted enclosures at Welcombe at the beginning of the seventeenth century has always been considered chiefly of interest because Shakespeare’s name was associated with it. But the incidents are of great importance in the history of Stratford-on-Avon and its relation to William Combe, entirely apart from the interest Shakespeare gives to the proceedings, The facts are worth recalling in relation to the great fires, which I discussed in this paper lately under the title of “Fires and Thatch at Stratford-on-Avon.” Just about the time of the disastrous fire of 9th July 1614, John Combe, the money-lender, died. After various charitable bequests, in his will dated 28th January 1612-13, he desires to be buried in the church near his mother, and a convenient tomb to be set over him of the value of threescore pounds. He leaves his brother George Combe the land “called Parson’s Close, or Shakespeare’s Close” in Hampton; to his brother John Combe his property in Warwick; residuary legatees were William and Thomas Combe his nephews (proved 10th November 1616). Hardly had they inherited (before even they had proved their uncle’s will), William took it into his head to enclose the Common Fields of Welcombe, over most of which he was chief landlord. We can find a good many details of the proceedings, preserved in the crabbed characters in which Thomas Greene made his memoranda, in a few leaves which have been called “His Diary,” now among the Stratford Records. This shows that Shakespeare went up to London on 16th November, and next day Thomas Greene, then staying in London, “went to see him how he did.” They were both full of “the enclosures,” and Shakespeare told Greene the latest news of the plan and the schemes, adding that “he thought nothing would be done.” That very night, however, Greene drew up the petition of the town, and “gave it to Edmund to write fair, so that Greene and Mr. Wyatt might see it before it was wrytten to be presented to the Lordes,” that is, the Lords of the Privy Council. On the 22nd Greene records that he heard that Lord Carew meant to oppose the enclosing all he might, and Mr. Mainwaring said if he did not do it well he cared not to do it at all. This “Lord Carew” is he who married Joyce Clopton, and whose tomb is in the church at Stratford. Thomas Greene was Town Clerk, and he notes on 5th December that six of the company (himself among them) were to “go to Mr. Combe, and present their loves, and desire he would be pleased to forbeare the enclosing.” They went on the 9th, and were not satisfied with the results. William Combe said he would be glad of their loves, but the enclosure would not be hurtful to the town; indeed, there would be some profit in it. Thomas Combe said “they were all curres,” and spoke of “spitting one of the dogs.”
Mr. Spenser said the Lord Chancellor was their friend, and Sir Fulke Greville advised them on a precedent. But William Combe went on determinedly. “The Miscellaneous Documents” and reports of the Council meetings at the Hall give details of his actions. Thomas Greene says in his Diary on the 23rd December 1614, that at the Hall that day the company had written through him to Mr. Mainwaring and Mr. Shakespeare (and he himself wrote a private letter “to his cosen Shakespeare”) to prove the “inconvenience” of the proposed enclosure. Neither of the letters to Shakespeare has been preserved, but that to Mainwaring has, and from it we may have some notion of the arguments of the other. (Wheler MS., i, 109.) This Mr. Mainwaring was the steward and agent of the Lord Chancellor Ellesmere, who seems to have had some interest in local affairs, and who in the earlier stages at least seems to have co-operated with William Combe. It was addressed “To the Worshipfull Arthur Mainwaring, Esq., at the Rt. Hon. the Lord Chancellor his howse.” The Bailiff and the company showed him that by the Charter of Edward VI the tithes were allowed them for the support of the almshouses, the school, and the bridge. “We hear that some land is conveyed to you in Welcombe, and that you intend enclosure. We entreat you to call to mind the manifold great and often miseries this Borough hath sustained by casualties of fires fresh in memory, and now of late one dying in the ashes of desolacion, and in your Christian meditations to bethink you that such inclosure will tend to the great disabling of performance of those good meanings of that godly king, to the ruyne of this Borough wherein live above seven hundred poor which receive almes, whose curses and clamours will be poured out to God against the enterprise of such a thing.” That was the way the Corporation looked at the enclosure. They “could not fulfil their trust to do the best possible for the town” without opposing it tooth and nail. And Thomas Greene could not fulfil his duty to the Corporation without working along with them, and we may be sure that his letter to Shakespeare was strong enough to convince the poet also. The Christmas of 1614 was a gloomy one for Stratford, with the ruins of blackened houses lying around, the poor calling for shelter and food, and the great dread of this new disaster looming all the more largely before them because of the general depression. The year 1615 saw a pitched battle. The aldermen took what legal action they could in their own right; they filed their “complaints” in many courts; they were driven into unnecessary expenses of various kinds; they sent Thomas Greene often to Warwick and to London; and all because of William Combe’s unsettling whim. He had sent his own servants and employed others, Stephen Sly among them, to dig ditches round the land he wished to enclose, and Thomas Greene writes that on 7th January “William Combe had told Baylis that some of the better sort meant to go and throw down the ditches, and said ‘I would they durst’ in a threatening manner with very great passion and anger.” Two days after some of the Corporation did, indeed, send on their spades to avoid a riot, and they went themselves and filled in the ditches. They were personally injured by Combe’s servants. William Combe said, “They were a company of factious knaves, and he will do them all the harm he can,” and added, “they were puritan knaves, and underlings in their colour.” Next day Mr. Archer was appealed to as a justice of the peace and a commoner to prevent a breach of the peace. He proposed for the preventing of tumults that there should be a stay of proceedings; that no further ditching or ploughing should be done till the 24th March, and no further ditches to be thrown down before that date. (While they were discussing these matters, however, the remainder of the ditches were being filled in by women and children.) On the 11th of January 1614-15 they took an attorney’s opinion as to what constituted a riot; and on the 12th Mr. Replingham came to the Hall, hoping to talk the company over. The Bailiff said he would never agree to the enclosures as long as he lived. Then Mr. Replingham wanted him to bind some of the inhabitants over to good behaviour. Thomas Greene said he would not bind them for all his clerk’s fees. On the 16th Mr. Combe went to London to push his cause as he might. He then rated the value of the enclosure at £250 per annum. On the 25th of January Mr. Chandler and Mr. Daniel Baker went to London to take advice on their side. A lull seemed to come into the proceedings, probably because of Mr. Archer’s decision above noted. On the 24th of February they resolved to take Sir Edward Coke’s opinion. On the 22nd of March Mr. Chandler for the Corporation did present a petition to the Lord Chief Justice at Coventry, and Mr. Combe called him a knave and a liar to his face. The Lord Chief Justice bade Chandler remind him of the case when he came to Warwick on the 27th. There he definitely said that it was against the laws of the realm and must be stopped. Thomas Greene says in his Diary, 1st April 1615: “Mr. Baker told me at his shop-house that the day before he was in Sir William Somerville’s and Mr. Combe’s company a-hunting in Awston fields, and Mr. Combe told him he might thank me for the petition, and offered to sell him lands to the amount of £50 per annum lying in Bridgetown among the Lord Carew’s land there, and that he never meant to inclose.” On the 2nd of April Mr. Combe asked Mr. Alderman Parsons why he was against the enclosures, and he said, “We are all sworn men for the good of the Borough and to preserve their inheritance, therefore they would not have it said in future time they were the men which gave way to the undoing of the town; and that all three fires were not so great a loss to the town as the enclosures would be.” On the 12th of April Mr. Parsons reported that he had been beaten by Mr. Combe’s men.
On the 19th April Laurence Wheeler and Lewis Hiccox started ploughing on their own land within the intended enclosure, and Mr. Combe railed at them; but the next day they returned, and Mr. Nash and many other tenants did the same, and Mr. Combe became still more wrathful. Mr. Combe’s next move was to try to get Sir Edward Greville and Sir Arthur Ingram to sell him the royalty of the town; but Sir Henry Rainsford told Greene he would never get that, and added that he was going to sue Mr. Combe on his own account in an action for trespass, and would sue him in the Star Chamber for riots, and he was going to sue Thomas Combe on a bond for £40, and so the bitterness spread. September saw fresh quarrels with Mr. Combe. On 14th December Greene notes, “Mr. Francis Smith told me that Mr. Thomas Combe told him that his brother would plow this year for his own good, but next year would lay it down to spite me. The Combes questioned my Lord Chief Justice’s authority to make any such order as was made, there being nothing before him.” And again there was another Christmas clouded by threatened enclosures, Shakespeare’s last Christmas upon earth.