Old House on North Quay. Weymouth
Of the old chapel,[52] the one remaining stone is preserved in the wall of a school. The chapel was a chapel of ease to Wyke Regis, the mother-church of Weymouth, and was dedicated to St. Nicholas. It stood on the summit of a hill overlooking the old town of Weymouth, and its site is commemorated in the name “Chapelhaye,” by which the district is known. There are several documents extant relating to this chapel, and among extracts from the Liceirce is the following:—
None shall fail at the setting forth of the procession of Corpus Christi day, on pain of forfeiting one pound of wax, and each brother shall pay six pennies to the procession, and pay yearly.
Old Chair at Weymouth.
This relates to the fraternity or guild in the Chapel of St. Nicholas, which was founded by a patent granted in 20 Henry VIII. to Adam Moleyns, Dean of Sarum, and certain parishioners of Wyke Regis, and known as “The Fraternity or Guild of St. George in Weymouth.”
Before the building of a bridge across the harbour the means of direct communication between the two towns was, so Leland says in 1530, by means of a boat, drawn over by a rope affixed to two posts, erected on either side of the harbour, a contrivance which was in use at Portland Ferry as late as 1839. In 1594 this primitive method of crossing gave way on the erection of the wooden bridge before referred to, erected at the expense of several wealthy merchants of London, who appear to have had trading interests here. This, in its turn, was so seriously injured during the Civil Wars, that it fell to pieces, and was rebuilt in 12 Anne by Thomas Hardy, Knt., William Harvey, James Littleton, and Reginald Marriott, the towns’ Parliamentary representatives, and it continued in use until 1741, when a bridge sixty yards long, with a draw-bridge in the centre, took its place. The celebrated Bubb Dodington, the first and only Lord Melcombe, contributed largely to its cost. In 1770 another bridge was erected some seventy yards westward, thus increasing the length of the harbour; but as the inhabitants were forced to make a considerable detour to reach it, they petitioned against the proposed alteration, but to no purpose. In 1820 it was determined to erect the first bridge of stone,[53] which is still in use, and only calls for mention here from the fact that on pulling down some adjacent houses an urn filled with silver coins of Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I. was found; and it is said that some of the inhabitants had a fine haul of “treasure trove” on this occasion. More interesting, perhaps, was the discovery of a gilt brass crucifix, four inches long; and on the wall of one of the demolished houses was painted the following verse:—
God saue our Queene Elizabethe,
God send hir happie dayes;
God graunt her grace to