English Economic History: Select Documents

by Unknown

[270] This and the following document deal with the confiscation of that part of the property of gilds which was devoted to religious purposes. The Act printed above was a re-enactment with some important variations of an Act of 1545 (37 Hen. VIII, c. 4). For its object and effect see Ashley, Economic History, Vol. I, part II, pp. 142-145, and pp. 184-187, who gives reasons for disagreeing with the statement of Thorold Rogers (Six Centuries of Work and Wages, pp. 347-350, and The Economic Interpretation of English History, p. 15) that the Act "suppressed" the craft gilds; Pollard, The Political History of England 1547-1603, pp. 17-20 ("the greatest educational opportunity in English history was lost, and the interests of the nation were sacrificed to those of its aristocracy"); Leach, English Schools at the Reformation, p. 68; Toulmin Smith's English Gilds. Lever (Sermons 1550, Arber's Reprints, pp. 32, 73, and 81) complains bitterly of the use to which the confiscated property was put. "For in suppressing of abbeys, cloisters, colleges, and chantries, the intent of the King's Majesty that dead is, was, and of this our King now is, very godly.... Howbeit covetous officers have so used this matter that even those goods which did serve to the relief of the poor, the maintenance of learning, and to comfortable necessary hospitality in the Commonwealth, be now turned to maintain worldly, wicked, covetous ambition." ... "Your Majesty hath had given and received by Act of Parliament, colleges, chantries, and gilds for many good considerations, and especially, as appeareth in the same Act, for erecting of grammar schools to the education of youth in virtue and godliness, to the further augmenting of the Universities, and better provision for the poor and needy. But now many grammar schools, and much charitable provision for the poor be taken, sold, and made away, to the great slander of you and your laws, to the utter discomfort of the poor, to the grievous offence of the people, to the most miserable drowning of youth in ignorance, and for decay of the Universities."

8. Regrant to Coventry and Lynn of Gild Lands Confiscated under I Ed. VI, c. 14. [Acts of the Privy Council, New Series, pp 193-5], 1548.

At Westminster, Sunday, the vith of May, 1548

Whereas in the last parliament, holden at Westminster in November, the first year of the King's Majesty's reign, among other articles contained in the act for colleges and chantry lands, etc., to be given unto his Highness, it was also inserted that the lands pertaining to all guilds and brotherhoods within this realm should pass unto his Majesty by way of like gift, at which time divers then being of the lower house did not only reason and argue against that article made for the guildable lands, but also incensed many others to hold with them, among the which none were stiffer nor more busily went about to impugn the said articles than the burgesses for the town of Lynn, in the county of Norfolk, and the burgesses of the city of Coventry, in the county of Warwick; the burgesses of Lynn alleging that the guild lands belonging to their said town were given for so good a purpose (that is to say, for the maintenance and keeping up of the pier and seabanks there, which being untended to would be the loss of a great deal of low ground of the country adjoining), as it were great pity the same should be alienated from them as long as they employed it to so necessary an use; and semblably they of Coventry declaring that where that city was of much fame and antiquity, some times very wealthy though now of late years brought into decay and poverty, and had not to the furniture of the whole multitude of the Commons there, being to the number of xi or xii thousand housling people, but two churches wherein God's service is done, whereof the one, that is to say, the church of Corpus Christi, was specially maintained of the revenues of such guild lands lying only in houses and tenements within the town as had been given heretofore by diverse persons to that use and others no less beneficial to the supporting of that city; if therefore now by the act the same lands should pass from them it should be a manifest cause of the utter desolation of the city, as long as the people, when the churches were no longer supported, nor God's service done therein, and the other uses and employments of those lands omitted, should be of force constrained to abandon the city and seek new dwelling places, which should be more loss unto the King's Majesty by losing so [much] of the yearly fee farm there, and subversion of so notable a town, than the accruing of a sort of old houses and cottages pertaining to the guilds and chantries of the said cities, should be of value or profit to his Majesty, as long as his Highness should be at more cost with the reparations of the same than the yearly rents would amount unto.

In respect of which their allegations and great labour made herein unto the House, such of his Highness Council as were of the same House there present thought it very likely and apparent that not only that article for the guildable lands should be dashed, but also that the whole body of the act might either sustain peril or hindrance being already engrossed, and the time of the Parliament Prorogation hard at hand, unless by some good policy the principal speakers against the passing of that article might be stayed; whereupon they did anticipate this matter with the Lord Protector's Grace and others of the Lords of his Highness Council, who, pondering on the one part how the guildable lands throughout this realm amounted to no small yearly value, which by the article aforesaid were to be accrued to his Majesty's possessions of the Crown; and on the other part weighing in a multitude of free voices what moment the labour of a few setters on had been of heretofore in like cases, thought it better to stay and content them of Lynn and Coventry by granting to them to have and enjoy their guild lands, etc., as they did before, than through their means, on whose importune labour and suggestion the great part of the Lower House rested, to have the article defaced, and so his Majesty to forego the whole guild lands throughout the realm; and for these respects and also for avoiding of the proviso which the said burgesses would have had added for the guilds to this article, which might have ministered occasion to others to have laboured for the like, they resolved that certain of his Highness' Councillors being of the Lower House should persuade with the said burgesses of Lynn and Coventry to desist from further speaking or labouring against the said article, upon promise to them that if they meddled no further against it, his Majesty, once having the guildable lands granted unto him by the act as it was penned unto him, should make them over a new grant of the lands pertaining then unto their guilds, etc., to be had and used to them as afore. Which thing the said Councillors did execute as was devised, and thereby stayed the speakers against it, so as the act passed with the clause for guildable lands accordingly.

And now seeing that the Mayors and others of the said city of Coventry and town of Lynn by reason of that promise so made unto them have humbly made suit unto the Lord Protector's Grace and Council aforesaid that the same may be performed unto them, which promise his Grace and the said Council do think that his Highness is bound in honour to observe, although it were not so that indeed those lands which belonged to the guild at Lynn cannot well be taken from them, being so allotted and employed to the maintenance of the pier and seabanks there, which of necessity as was alleged, require daily reparations, no more than the guild and chantry lands at Coventry upon the foresaid considerations could conveniently (as was thought) be taken from them without putting the said city to apparent danger of desolation; it was therefore this day ordained, and by the accord and assent of the Lord Protector's Grace and others of his Highness Council decreed, that letters patents should be made in due form under the King's Majesty's Great Seal of England whereby the said guild lands belonging to the two churches at Coventry should be newly granted unto them of the city for ever, and the lands lately pertaining to the guild of Lynn also granted unto that town for ever, to be used to such like purpose and intent as aforetimes by force of their grants they were limited to do accordingly.

9. A Petition of the Bakers of Rye to the Mayor, Jurats and Council to Prevent the Brewers Taking their Trade [Hist. MSS. Com, Thirteenth Report, App. Part IV, p. 45], 1575.

Whereas, as well in ancient time as now of late days, good and wholesome laws have been by the State of this realm devised, ordained, and enacted for the better maintenance of the subjects of the same; amongst which laws it is ordained how each sort of people, being handicraftsmen or of occupation, should use the trade and living wherein they have been lawfully trained up and served for the same as the said laws do appoint; nevertheless, it may please your worships, divers persons do seek unto themselves by sinister ways and contrary to those good laws certain trades to live by, and not only to live by but inordinately to gain, to the utter overthrow of their neighbours which have lawfully used those occupations, and served for the same according to the said laws. Amongst which sort of people certain of the brewers of this town use the trade and occupation of bakers, not having been apprentices to the same, nor so lawfully served in the same trade as they thereby may justly challenge to use the said occupation of baking, to the utter impoverishment of the bakers of the said town, their wives, children, and families, and contrary to the law, equity, and good conscience; whereby we whose names are underwritten shall be constrained to give over, and for themselves to seek some other means to live, and to leave our wives and children, if in time remedy be not provided by your worships for the same. James Welles.
John Mylles.
Edward Turner.
Philip Caudy.
William Gold.

10. Letter to Lord Cobham from the Mayor and Jurats of Rye concerning the Preceding Petition [ibid., pp. 47-8], 1575.

Upon the lamentable complaint of our poor neighbours the bakers, we did with good and long deliberation consider of their cause, and finding that their decay is such as without speedy reformation they shall not have wherewith to maintain their wives, children, and family, which are not few in number, a thing in conscience to be lamented, and we for remission in duty to be greatly blamed; and since the overthrow of these poor men is happened by reason of the brewers (who ought by the laws of this realm not to be bakers also) have by our sufferance (but the rather for that Robert Jackson is towards your Lordship) used both to bake and brew of long time, whereby Robert Jackson (God be thanked) is grown to good wealth, and the whole company of the bakers thereby utterly impoverished, and finding that by no reasonable persuasion from us, neither with the lamentable complaint of the bakers, those brewers would leave baking, we were driven by justice and conscience to provide for their relief the speedier. Whereupon we did, with consent of Mayor, Jurats, and Common Council, make a certain decree, lawful, as we think, for the better maintenance of them, their wives, children and family, a matter in civil government worth looking into when the state of a common weal is preferred before the private gain of a few, which decree we required Mr. Gaymer to acquaint your Honour with, at his last being with you, who upon his return advertised us that your Lordship had the view thereof, and also of your Honour's well liking of the same, humbly beseeching your good Lordship's aid and continuance therein, whereof we have no doubt, being a matter that doth concern (and that according to the laws of the realm) the relief of those who are brought to the brink of decay.