“Next is a house called the Leaden porch, lately divided into two tenements; whereof one is a tavern, and then one other house for a merchant, likewise called the leaden Porch, but now turned to a cook’s house. Next is a fair house and a large, wherein divers mayoralties have been kept, whereof twain in my remembrance; to wit, Sir William Bowyer and Sir Henry Huberthorne” (Stow’s Survey, pp. 162-163).
In modern Lime Street the first thing that attracts attention is an old iron gateway leading to a little paved yard where once stood St. Dionis Backchurch. Laid in a horizontal row are nine tombstones, on which one can look down. A steep flight of stone steps leads up to the parish offices, and the backs of business houses surround the court. At No. 15 is the Pewterers’ Hall.
THE PEWTERERS COMPANY
The earliest information respecting the Company is found in the records of the City of London, 22 Edward III., A.D. 1348, when the mayor and aldermen are prayed by the good folk of the trade to hear the state and points of the trade, to provide redress and amendment of the defaults thereof for the common profit, and to ordain two or three of the trade to oversee the alloys and workmanship.
In the year 1443 (22 Henry VI.), in consequence of the complaints of “the multitude of tin which was untrue and deceyvable brought to the City, the defaults not being perceptible until it comes to the melting,” the mayor and aldermen granted to the Company the right to search and assay all the tin which was brought into the City of London.
Edward IV. (1473-74) incorporated the Company by royal charter.
This power was recognised and confirmed by charters granted successively by Henry VIII., Philip and Mary, Queen Elizabeth, James I., and Queen Anne.
An Act of Parliament confirming the Company’s powers to search for bad wares was passed in 1503-1504, 19 Henry VII. c. 6., confirmed by other Acts, 4 Henry VIII. c. 7., 1512-13; 25 Henry VIII. c. 9., 1533-34; and a statute 33 Henry VIII. c. 4., 1541-42, prohibited the hawking of pewter.
The maintenance of the good faith of the trade appears to have been one of the primary considerations in the proceedings of the Company.
In 1555 it was resolved that any member buying metal of tylors, labourers, boys, women, or suspected persons, or between six at night and six in the morning, if the metal should prove to have been stolen, should not only be dismissed the Company, but stand to such punishment as the Lord Mayor and aldermen might direct.