Formerly Cheshire people frequently married with neighbouring families of like station in life, according to their common proverb, “It is better to marry over the mixen than over the moor;” and even yet there is a saying: “If you are going into Cheshire, remember they are all cousins.”
The long-established peasant families must not be passed over in silence. Suspicious of strangers, they understand “the law of the land” very differently from the inhabitants of crowded cities and manufacturing towns. Country people still speak with confidence and respect of “our squire,” just as the landlords talk of “our people”; although it must be admitted that the mutual social influences of old English life are now fast waning. A former manifestation of goodwill and good understanding among the tenantry of a large estate may here be mentioned. On the death of the Rev. Sir Thomas Broughton, Bart., in July 1813, the coffin containing his remains was borne to burial on the shoulders of relays of farmers by road from Doddington Hall to Broughton Church, a distance of no less than twelve miles!
The numerous townships into which Cheshire is divided are almost entirely rural in their situation; and in few parts of the county, Wirral being the chief exception, are the dwellings sufficiently near each other to constitute what is generally known as a village. I have heard a countryman express this peculiarity in these words: “The common people live in the lanes, but the quality (that is, the well-to-do farmers) live up in the fields.”
With regard to Cheshire families in the dim past, Camden the antiquary of the sixteenth century wrote:[49] “Cheshire is the great nursing-mother of the gentry; for there is no other English county that formerly supplied the King’s army with more nobility, or that could number more knightly families.”
[49] The original words in the Britannia read: “Cestria eximia nobilitatis altrix; nec enim alia est in Anglia provincia, quæ plures nobiles in aciem eduxerit, et plures equestres familias numerarit.”
Contemporary with Camden, John Speed, the historian, a native of the county, calls Cheshire the “seed-plot of gentility.” In proof of this, we refer to the statement already made in the historical introduction to this volume, that William the Conqueror constituted Cheshire a county palatine, bestowing the earldom on his nephew, Hugh Lupus, whose title, Earl of Chester, has belonged, since the time of Edward I., by hereditary right to the heir-apparent of the English Crown. Cheshire, like Normandy in France, thus became an imperium in imperio, with the Earl as titular sovereign and courts of justice, administered by a Constable, Seneschall, Chamberlain, Justices, Barons of Exchequer, Sheriff, Attorney, Escheator, &c. So constituted, the county preserved its independent existence until the time of Henry VIII., when it became subject to the Crown; and in the next reign the county sent its first representatives to the national Parliament at Westminster. The first Earl held a large part of the earldom in his own hands; and portioned out the rest of the land among military men, whom he created barons, or tenants in capite; and their hereditary honorary services for their fees were due to him and his successors. In course of time these fees became a civil establishment rather than a military plan, and the services began to be compounded. Agricultural and other services grew out of the sub-infeudations of the chief tenants; and eventually, by a statute, 12 Chas. II., local baronies and manors became little more than nominal institutions, and as such they continue to be.
It is said the Grosvenors are descended from Gilbert le Grosvenor, who came over from Normandy with Hugh Lupus, his uncle; the Mainwarings from Earl Randle; and the Egertons and Cholmondeleys from the Norman Barons of Malpas. The ancient, but now extinct, families of Merbury, Hatton, Rutter, Birkenhead, Vernon, Leftwich, and Fitton, each bore three garbs or (three golden wheatsheaves) on their shields, an honourable charge claimed to have been assigned them by the sixth Earl, Randle Blundeville, who bore the same device. In modern times the garb or occurs on the arms of Wicksted, Cholmondeley, and Grosvenor; and, in the last named, since the time of Richard II., when Sir Robert Grosvenor contended with the proud Sir Richard Scrope of Yorkshire in the long heraldic suit (1386-1389) as to the right to bear Azure a bend or, with the result that Sir Robert should bear a golden sheaf instead of a golden band, as descended from the Earls of Chester.
In the ancient days of chivalry the military aristocracy promoted peace and order within the county, and defended it against raids from beyond the Welsh Marshes. Cheshire archers became famous; and, led by their own knights, gained renown in the wars of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
If military achievement be claimed in justification of the proverb—“Cheshire, chief of men”—quoted by Drayton, it must be remembered there was a rival in the field. The “Men of Kent,” who boldly said to William the Conqueror—
“We are ready to offer thee either Peace or War at thy own choice and election—Peace with faithful obedience, if thou wilt permit us to enjoy our liberties; War, and that most deadly, if thou deny it”—