1594. A violent storm or tempest, which began September the twenty-first and lasted till the twenty-fourth.
1596. A new wind-mill erected at Gannock—occasioned probably by the difficulty of obtaining a sufficient supply of water to work the town water-mill.
1597. The great Mill-dyke from Sayer’s Marsh new cast. But the Mill afterwards seems to have been in general but ill supplied with water. It was at last given up, after having been the grist mill of the town time immemorial. It stood by the Lancastrian school and new bridge. The lane below took from it the name of Mill-lane.—Great sickness and mortality in the town this year; particularly from March to July, when 320 persons are said to have been buried in St. James’s church yard.—Other accounts place this mortality in the following year.
1598. One Elizabeth Housegoe executed for Witchcraft.—Another legal, but most foul murder committed by Lynn magistrates.—One MS. mentions two men of war, as fitted out this year, at the expense of this town and Yarmouth.
1602. A severe shock of an Earthquake felt here on Christmas Eve.—also the Windmill removed from the South gates to Kettle-mills: but not by the earthquake, we suppose.
1604. A man executed for a rape, on a child under ten years of age.
1605. King James’s Charter was this year obtained, which greatly augmented the privileges of the corporation; particularly in exempting them from the jurisdiction of the Lord High Admiral, and investing the mayor and burgesses with that power within this borough and its liberties. This Charter is long and its grants most ample.
The town-clerk, Vallenger, also this year built the South Lynn Almshouses, for four poor men. (see p. [1133], [1160], and [1185].) A great fire broke out in High street, in which a man and his wife and family perished. The Cistern at Kettle mills was made.
1606. A vessel of one hundred tons overthrown in this haven, in February, and not recovered till April.
1607. A very high tide, which flowed up quite to the Tuesday market-cross.