Some persons of considerable experience have concluded that the ore was washed ere placed in the forge. The mounds of deep red earth that occur in some parts of the Forest are supposed to establish this practice. If ever such was the custom, no other trace of it appears, and it is quite unknown now. In parts of South Wales, water may be used with advantage, but were it applied to the mineral here, much would be washed away, because of its finely divided state.
An interval of two centuries and upwards intervenes at this point. No data for determining the state of the Dean Forest iron works again occurs until the reign of Elizabeth. For the mean time, however, there seems every probability that operations went on without intermission, although some decline had apparently taken place. Perhaps the dissolution of the monasteries interrupted the works at Flaxley and Tintern, by causing the discharge of the old hands and the employment of unskilled operatives in their stead.
The domestic series of the State Papers enable the clue to be resumed under date 30th June, 1566, when one William Humfrey, upon information derived from some German miners, addressed a letter “to Sir Wm Cecill abt the plenty of good iron contained in the Forest of Dean.” It was, no doubt, the general rumour of this fact that rendered it an object of
spoliation to the would-be invaders from Spain in 1588. At this date, wire, drawn by strength of hand, is said to have been made at Sowdley. For such kind of manufacture the Forest iron, from its toughness and ductility, was admirably fitted, without requiring any essential change in the mode of reducing the ore, although improved methods of doing so were being adopted in other parts of the kingdom, particularly in Sussex. That the old way of working lingered long in the northern counties appears from a statement of Mr. Wyrrall’s, to the effect that “The father of the late Mr. James Cockshut of Pontypool found, some years ago, an old man working by himself at a bloomary forge in a remote part of Yorkshire. Being himself well acquainted with every branch of the iron trade and works, he stayed with the man long enough to investigate and comprehend his mode of working, and saw him work, with his own hands, a piece of iron from the ore to the bar.”
The earliest intimation of any decided alteration being adopted in the manner of operating on the raw metal occurs in the terms of a “bargayne” made by the Crown “wth Giles Brudges and others,” [28] on 14th June, 1611, demising “libertye to erect all manner of workes, iron or other, by lande or water, excepting wyer workes, and the same to pull downe, remove, and alter att pleasure,” with “libertye to take myne oare and synders, either to be used att the workes or otherwise,” &c. By “synders” is meant the refuse of the old forges, but which, by the new process,
could be made to yield a profitable per centage of metal, which the former method had failed to extract.
Early in the year following (17 Feb. 1612), a similar “bargayne” was made with no less a person than William, Earl of Pembroke, elder brother of Sir Philip Herbert, one of James I.’s earliest favourites. His high position did not prevent him, therefore, from engaging in manufacture and trade, only in the prosecution of them he would be made to pay accordingly. Thus, whilst the former party paid 3s. for each cord of wood, the earl was charged 4s. for 12,000 cords yearly for twenty-one years, or £200 per annum, with £33 6s. 8d. besides, all for fuel only. He was, however, “to have allowance of reasonable fireboote for the workmen out of the dead and dry wood, and to inclose a garden not exceedinge halfe an acre to every howse, and likewise to inclose for the necessity of the workes the number of XII. acres to every severall worke; the howses and enclosures to be pulled downe and layd open as the workes shall cease or remove.”
Similar appreciation of the remunerative character of iron making occurs in connection with a still more illustrious person. There exists a letter, dated 7 May, 1611, addressed by Sir Francis Bacon to Cecil, Lord Salisbury, endorsed, “Ld Lisle, Sir F. Bacon, and others, to be preferred in the sale intended in the Forest of Deane for some reasonable portion of wood, for maintenance of their Wire-works, paying as any others.”
The letter itself runs in these words:—
“It may please your good Lordship,
“Understanding that his Majesty will be pleased to sell some good portion of wood in the Forest of Deane, which lies very convenient to the Company’s Wire Works at Tynterne and Whitebrooke, we are enforced to have recourse to your lordship, as to our Governor of the said Company, humbly praying your lordship to afford us some reasonable quantity thereof, the better to uphold the said works, whereof by information from our farmers there, we stand in such need, as without your lordship’s favour we shall hardly be able to subsist any long time. We do not entreat your lordship for any other or more easy price than that your lordship directs the sale of it to others; only we humbly pray for some preferment in the opportunity of the place where the woods lie, and in the quantity, as it may answer in some portion to our wants. Herein, if your lordship will be pleased to favour us, then we humbly pray your lordship to direct us to some such persons as your Lordship resolves to employ in the business. And as we humbly take our leaves of your lordship,
“Your lordship’s humbly at command.
“London.”