1583. Gaywood river new cast, from the Kettle-mills to the Purfleet bridge.
1584. Lynn again visited by the Plague; on which account the mart was removed from Damgate to the Tuesday market-place; where it has been kept ever since.
1585. The stone-bridge (High Bridge) taken down, and two arches of brick added to it. The drain in Webster’s row, (Broad Street) also vaulted over with brick.
1586. The manufacture of Bays having failed, divers poor people were now employed at the Work-house in dressing hemp and making strings and tows for the fishermen.
The stone bridge, or High Bridge, was now also new built: that is, as we presume, the houses on each side, which had been pulled down: for the new arches had been built the year before.
1587. The pinnacle or top part of St. James’s steeple taken down, and the remaining part made flat and covered with tiles.—Sir Robert Southwell, admiral of Norfolk, with several commissioners and justices held a court of admiralty at Lynn, at which sixteen pirates were condemned, most of whom were executed at Gannock.
This year also John Wanker’s wife and the widow Porker, were both carted here for whoredom, a crime which appears to have been then greatly discountenanced in this town; so that those found guilty of it were put in a cart, or fastened to its tail, and driven or dawn, through the whole town, as spectacles of detestation. The business is now managed differently.
1588. The memorable Feast of Reconciliation, which far excelled all our other Lynn Feasts, was this year instituted. It was a meeting of the mayor, some of the aldermen, common council-men, and the clergy, held the first Monday in the month, to check discord, reconcile differences, and decide all manner of controversies among the inhabitants. It was well calculated to do good, and did much good, no doubt, while it was duly attended to; but is become now as a tale that is told, and seems like other feasts to be now fast passing towards oblivion.—This year Lynn is also said to have furnished a pinnace to oppose the dreaded Spanish Armada.
1589. Five sail of ships from this town formed part of the squadron of Drake and Norris in their expedition against Spain; and it is said they returned home safe without any loss.
1590. One Margaret Read burnt here for Witchcraft—a reputed crime deemed in those days as atrocious as murder, if not much more so. The history of Lynn is sadly stained and disgraced with accounts of these executions, or rather legal murders committed by the magistrates.—The same year the foundation of the South-gate was secured from the danger of being undermined by water.