238. Finger Pillories in Churches.
—Besides some interesting monuments, &c., to be found in the church of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, there stands under the western gallery a finger pillory, or stocks to confine the fingers only: it is fastened at its right-hand extremity into the wall, and consists of two pieces of oak; the bottom and fixed piece is three feet eight inches long; the width of the whole is four and a half inches, and when closed it is five inches deep: the left-hand extremity is supported by a leg of the same width as the top, and two feet six inches in length; the upper piece is joined to the lower by a hinge, and in this lower and fixed horizontal part are thirteen perpendicular holes, varying in size; the largest are towards the right hand: these holes are sufficiently deep to admit the finger to the second joint, and a slight hollow is made to receive the third one, which lies flat; there is of course a corresponding hollow in the top or movable part, which, when shut down, incloses the whole finger.
Its use is stated to have been for the punishment of persons guilty of mal-practices during divine service: truly, a mischievous urchin, or a lout of a farm servant, dragged off to the stocks, must have been a scene extremely edifying to the congregation, particularly if the offenders were obstreperous, and had no inclination whatever to be in a fix.
Query, Is there another known instance of stocks for the fingers alone, and applied to similar purposes?
THOS. LAWRENCE.
Ashby-de-la-Zouch.
239. Stallenge Queries.
—1. What was the christian name, birth, and parentage of the Stallenge who planted the mulberry trees at Sion House at the commencement of the seventeenth century?
2. What was the name of the first wife of that Sir Nicholas Stallenge who, towards the close of the sixteenth century, married as his second wife Florence Kenn, widow of Sir Christopher Kenn, of Kenn, in the county of Somerset?
3. What city or castle in England was Sir Thomas Stallenge his son governor of?