Knole and the Sackvilles

by V. Sackville-West

That your said petitioners have every year since ye coming of his present Majesty had either foot or horse quartered on them, even much beyond their neighbours ... The said innkeepers are willing to serve their King and Country, but beyond their ability cannot, they therefore humbly pray that care may be taken for procuring their arrears due, or at least to prevent more soldiers coming on them, which they understand are, unless your Honour will stand in the gap ...

[Knole MSS.]

Some of the foregoing papers, then, account for his income; we have also some notes as to his expenses. To his servants he paid £8 to £10 a year for “ordinary men and maids.” For beef he paid 2s. a stone; for mutton, 3d. a pound; pullets were 6d. each; a goose was 1s. 8d.; a pheasant, 1s.; a hare, 8d.; a tongue, 1s.; a partridge, 9d.; a pigeon, 3d.; a turkey, 2s. 6d.; a calf’s head, 1s. 6d. A bushel of oysters cost him 4s. 6d.; a peck of damsons, 1s. Wheat cost him 7s. a bushel; salt, 5s. a bushel. For 130 walnuts he paid 1s. 6d., and for a dozen candles 5s. 6d.—a surprising price. We have also a detailed account of his cellar. For strong beer he paid 35s. a hogshead, and for small beer 10s. a hogshead. From July 1690 to November 1691 his total wine bill amounted to £598 19s. 4d., an alarming sum when we reflect that he was paying only 5s. 1d. for a gallon of red port, 6s. 8d. for a gallon of sherry, and 8s. for a gallon of canary. We are given the details entered in the cellar from August 1690 to January 1691; they are sufficiently formidable: 425 gallons of red port, 85 gallons of sherry, 72 gallons of canary, 63 gallons of white port, and a quart of hock. One wonders whether Lord Dorset was “laying down,” or whether this quantity was adequate only to the six months shown on the account book.

Lord Dorset seems to have carried large sums of money about on his person, for the steward’s account book at Knole shows a regular daily entry of 10s. for loose change to his Lordship, and when he was set upon by footpads near Tyburn they robbed him not only of his gold George, but also of forty or fifty pounds. This does not perhaps seem a very enormous sum for a wealthy man to carry, but it must always be remembered that in order to obtain the modern equivalent it is necessary to multiply by at least five.

Before leaving the Knole papers of this date—and there is much that I have regretfully discarded, many letters, for instance, regarding the election of Lord Buckhurst to the House of Commons, which throw interesting sidelights upon the methods of electioneering in the early days of Charles II—I should like to quote one letter of unknown authorship, relating to the Rye House Plot. The letter is addressed to Lord Dorset: it is unsigned and undated, but the date must be placed, by virtue of internal evidence, in July 1683, by reason of the reference to Captain Walcot who was tried on July 12th in connection with the plot.

The party that went for my Lord Essex found him in his garden gathering of nut-meg peaches, he was lodged in my Lord Feversham’s lodgings, in Whitehall, and the next day, having not made use of the favour of pen and ink, so well as my Lord Howard hath, he was sent to the Tower.

My Lord Howard runs like a spout, fresh, and fresh he hath writ enough to hang himself, and 1 hundred more, and cried enough to drown himself, he hath cast his lodgings in Whitehall.

Sir John Burlace was brought before the Council yesterday, upon sending intelligence to my Lord Lovelace that there was a warrant against him. He stayed one night in the messenger’s hands and was this morning bail for my Lord Lovelace, and both of them dismissed.

The enclosed is an account how far the Grand Jury hath proceeded, that little note hath the names of some of the Grand Jury.

None were tried this afternoon but Capt. Walcot who was cast by a most clear evidence being at several consults, the places all named, his raising of arms, his own letter to the King, and one of the consults was at the Vulture, Ludgate Hill, and Sheppard’s House, he had very little to say for himself, but that the witnesses swore away his life to secure their own, he excepted against all Jury men that were of the lieutenancy and behaved himself with a great deal of decency and resolution. They had a declaration ready drawn by Goodenough so soon as ever the King was killed, and particular men appointed to murder the most considerable persons. Borne by name was to kill this Lord Keeper, and refused it because it looked like an unneighbourly thing, my Lord pulled off his hat and said Thank you, neighbour.