“For our easier and better proceeding, let us once again return to Exmoor. We will, with an easy pace, ascend the mount of Hore Oak Ridge; not far from whence we shall find the spring of the rivulet Lynne, which, in his course, will soon lead us into the North Division, for I desire you should always swim with the stream, and neither stem wind nor tide. This passeth by Cunsbear, alias Countisbury, and naming Lynton, where Galfridus Lovet and Cecilia de Lynne held sometime land, and, speeding, falls headlong with a great downfall into the Severn at Lynmouth; a place unworthy the name of a haven, only a little inlet, which, in these last times, God hath plentifully stored with herrings (the king of fishes), which, shunning their ancient places of repair in Ireland, come hither abundantly in shoals, offering themselves (as I may say) to the fishers’ nets, who soon resorted hither with divers merchants, and so, for five or six years, continued to the great benefit and good of the country, until the parson taxed the poor fishermen for extraordinary unusual tithes, and then (as the inhabitants report) the fish suddenly clean left the coast, unwilling, as may be supposed, by losing their lives to cause contention. God be thanked, they begin to resort hither again, though not as yet in such multitudes as heretofore. Henry de Lynmouth, after him Isabella de Albino, and now Wichals, possesseth it. A generous family: he married Pomerois; his father, Achelond, his grandfather, Munck.”
Concerning the “generous family” more anon; we have not quite done with the sign of Pisces. Originally Lynmouth was a little village—Blackmore speaks of it as “the little haven of Lynmouth” (Lorna Doone, chapter xxxix.)—whose inhabitants dwelt in huts and depended for a livelihood on the curing of herrings, which was carried on in drying-houses. From the beginning of September to the end of October shoals of these fish frequented the shore, and sometimes their number was so great that tons of them were thrown away or used as manure. In 1797 the herrings deserted the coast, and the peasantry attributed their conduct to the insult just referred to. The common duration of truancy was computed at forty years—a calculation which seems to hold true of the period between 1747 and 1787. The following decade consisted of fat years, when the sea at Lynmouth yielded rich autumnal harvests, and masses of herrings were sent to Bristol, whence they were shipped to the West Indies. From 1797 to 1837, and indeed longer, the fish fought shy of the place, but not entirely. On Christmas Day, 1811, there was an exceptional and very abundant shoal of herrings, and the inhabitants were called out of church in order to take them out of the weirs. A similar gift of fortune marked the year 1823. Practically, however, the fishermen’s avocation was gone, and they had to look elsewhere for a livelihood. Happily, they did not look in vain. Pastured on the surrounding hills were large flocks of sheep, and in the neighbouring towns there was a constant demand for yarn. This was of two kinds—one for the woof, consisting of worsted, which was supplied by the Yorkshire mills; the other for the warp, which was of softer texture, and then made by hand. The latter industry became the chief—almost the sole—prop of Lynton and Lynmouth, where the good people diligently applied themselves to spinning, and by this means kept the wolf from the door.
The sea-fishing is not altogether unconnected with the history of the De Wichehalses, since the original fishermen are stated to have been Dutch Protestants forced by religious (or irreligious?) persecution to emigrate from their homes by the Zuyder Zee. The names Litson, Vellacot, etc., still borne by local families, are quoted as evidence of Dutch extraction. A trade in cured herrings sprang up with Scotland, and the Dutchmen not only had commercial transactions with Scotch sailors and traders, but married, many of them, braw Scotch lassies who came to buy their herrings. The possible bearing of this intercourse on the problem of Lorna Doone will not escape attention. It was at Lynmouth that old Will Watcombe, the great authority on the “Gulf Stream,” lived and sought to be buried (Lorna Doone, chapter xii.).
Now as to the Wichehalses, whose name Blackmore spells with a supererogatory “h”—Whichehalse. The Protestants of the Low Countries had often attempted, by petition and remonstrance, to bend the stubborn will of their master, Philip II., and not a few of the Gueux or Beggars—a sobriquet bestowed on the Huguenot conspirators who met at Breda—left the country in despair. In 1567 the Spanish despot dispatched to the ill-fated land the Duke of Alva with an army of 20,000 men, and the latter signalised his arrival by instituting a “Council of Blood,” which resulted in the execution of 1800 patriots, while 30,000 more were reduced to abject straits by the confiscation of their property. Hordes of terrified Dutch folk fled to England, in the wake of the nobles, and a certain number of them settled, as we have seen, on the north coast of Devon.
Hugh de Wichehalse belonged, strictly speaking, to neither class of fugitives. The head of a noble and wealthy family, which had early become converts to the principles of the Reformation, he continued to struggle for his beliefs until the fatal day of Gemmingen, when, escaping the clutches of the vindictive Spaniards, he crossed the channel with his wife and children. The bulk of his property had already, by a timely precaution, been removed hither.
Such is the tradition which has to be reconciled with the pedigree of the family in the visitation of 1620. This shows three generations, and, to say the least, would be consistent with a much longer settlement in the county. The following is a copy:—
