Written by Diana Wallis, research associate at the University of York’s Centre for Medieval Studies, this is the second of two guest blogs focused on the archive of the Company of Merchant Adventurers of the City of York. You can also listen to the companion podcast.
As outlined in the previous blog, The 1478 Petition of the York Mercers, there are two copies of the King’s response to the petition held in the archive of the Merchant Adventurers of York – one contained in the general archive and the other is within the Merchant Adventurers’ cartulary.1 The text of both documents is the same. The response is dated November 1478; we of course know that the petition was submitted to the King’s chancellery in London at the latest in January 1478 by the York MP and merchant Robert Amyas. Neither copy of the response appears to be original, but rather a copy of the text. The cartulary version along with the wording of what would seem to have been the final version of the petition comes first in that collection, before the petition; the storing and retention of this response, along with other important legal documents would appear to indicate its likely value to the mercers.
The copy of the King’s proclamation (ref: CMAY/1/5/3/1/2)
What is of interest is the time span which elapsed before an answer was received. It looks as though the petition was prepared with a view to the meeting of the parliament in January and February 1478. This parliament was largely taken up with the trial of the king’s brother Clarence, therefore very few parliamentary petitions were actually dealt with, and the York mercers petition is certainly not mentioned in the parliamentary roll for the session. This should not lead us to the conclusion that they were not active in pursuing their quest, which ultimately seems to have been dealt with as a petition to king and council, answered under the privy seal from Westminster in the November.
The cartulary copy of the proclamation (ref: CMAY/3/1/2, f.176)
Looking at the York Chamberlains’ Account Rolls for the period it becomes clear that York’s two MPs Robert Amyas and Miles Metcalfe were both paid by the city in connection with their parliamentary attendance, also specifically in relation to activities relating to ‘petitions’ in the plural.2 At the same time as the York mercers were concerned about John Pickering, the Mayor’s Council had an ongoing issue about fish garths. Fish garths were river or sea-shore enclosures designed to catch fish, particularly salmon, and are known to have been in existence on Yorkshire rivers from 1390s.3 Whilst there is no evidence of a petition relating to this subject, there is similar evidence of both the Council and the mercers drawing on the assistance of the same two local nobles Richard, Duke of Gloucester and Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland and there seems to be an identical pattern in how both undertook their ‘lobbying’ of these likely King’s Council members. This is perhaps no surprise given that a number of the leading mercers such as Todd and Ferriby, Wrangwish and Tong were equally deeply involved in the Mayor’s Council at this time – indeed Ferriby was actually Mayor. These it will be recalled were the same personalities who were also involved in the 1468 petition.
Given that this was the first parliament which Edward IV had called in some years, it is also likely that there would have been some liaison and lobbying between the various Yorkshire attendees. Space does not permit to describe all the likely networks between the various MPs and the nobles but perhaps one noteworthy Yorkshire connection was Robert Stillington, Bishop of Bath and Wells, whose relative John Stillington was a legal adviser to the York Mayor’s Council. At this time Robert Stillington also held the office for the 1478 parliament as one of the ‘Triers of Petitions’ of whom there were 15 in total, including Richard, Duke of Gloucester. These might have provided useful connections. The parliament concluded towards the end of February although the petition was not answered until later in the year. It seems likely that this was the result of Edward’s presence in the county which is documented for September 1478. He was in Pontefract, and York’s civic authorities particularly Ferriby as mayor and others appeared to waylay him on the road with the result that he diverted with some of his attendants to visit at least the proximity of the city.4 Given the personalities involved in these activities it seems most likely that the outstanding merchants’ petition would have been raised with him, a theory supported by the timing of the response.
The nature of the response has been variously described as a ‘proclamation’ or ‘declaration’ by the king. Comparison with responses to petitions earlier in the century, for which records do exist, would seem to indicate that the format is fairly usual for response by the king under the privy seal. The wording of the response is fairly strong, whilst copying what was requested in the final petition it also goes slightly further in insisting that if Pickering does not improve his treatment of the northern merchants he should appear before the king and explain himself. This seems fairly forceful particularly as the response is directed to him personally. The saving of the response in the York Merchant Adventurer’s cartulary would seem to highlight both their satisfaction with a successful outcome and the resultant importance they attributed to the contents.
CMAY/1/5/3/1/2 – Copy of King’s Proclamation 12 November 1478 & CMAY/3/1 – Cartulary 1420-1523, 176r and following. ↩︎
Dobson, R. B. ed., York Chamberlains’ Account Rolls 1396-1500. The Surtees Society, 1980, p.163. ↩︎
Lorraine Attreed. The York House Books 1461-1490, Volume 1,168 & Maud Sellars (ed.) York Memorandum Book II, 240, fo.332, https://archive.org/details/yorkmemorandum200surtuoft/page/239/mode/2up ↩︎
Written by Diana Wallis, research associate at the University of York’s Centre for Medieval Studies, this is the first of two guest blogs focused on the archive of the Company of Merchant Adventurers of the City of York. You can also listen to the companion podcast.
In early 1478 ‘the mercers of the city of York along with those of Hull, Beverley, Scarborough and all other northern parties’ presented a petition to the then king, Edward IV.1 They were complaining about the erosion of their rights by John Pickering, who had been governor of the English merchant ‘nation’ in the Low Countries since 1470. Letters patent issued by Henry IV in 1406/07 had granted the right for English merchants trading in Brabant, Holland, Zealand and Flanders to assemble and choose governors to their liking – one governor for the London merchants, and one for the merchants north of the Trent. However, since the election of John Pickering to the role of governor representing the London merchants, no separate northern governor had been elected, and Pickering was generally making life very difficult for the northern merchants. They alleged that he was keeping northern goods out of the best places in the markets, imposing higher costs and charges upon them and generally behaving in an unpleasant manner such that when they complained they were greeted with ‘rebukeful and unfitting language’.
The possible draft of the ‘complaint against John Pykryng’, 1748 (ref: CMAY/1/5/3/1/1)
Two versions of this petition are kept in the York Merchant Adventurers archive at the Borthwick Institute. The best known version of the petition is also transcribed in the work by the early 20th century archivist Maud Sellers on the York Mercers and Merchant Adventurers.2 However, examination of this original document leads to the conclusion that it was probably prepared by the merchants in the manner of a draft, perhaps thinking aloud at a meeting about their concerns. The document is on paper (as opposed to vellum) and contains various crossings out. As a full record of the grievances harboured by the York merchants it is an invaluable historical resource and has tended therefore to receive more attention and to be one referred to as ‘the petition’.
Alongside this draft petition, the Borthwick’s Merchant Adventurers’ archive also contains their Merchant’s cartulary; this is a bound volume of vellum pages mainly in a 15th century hand.3 A cartulary was generally seen as a way of preserving important documents like land deeds or other such which had evidentiary weight or might chronicle the history of an organisation.4 Thus, another version of the petition appears towards the end of the cartulary following on from pages dealing with membership and other internal matters concluding with a 15th century section including the petition, the answer to it, and a variety of other documents relating to a pension or land, which have a legal or evidential nature. This second version of the petition is very much shorter and more to the point. One would suggest that the merchants had received some legal or similar advice on how to proceed. By this period the normal contents of a petition had become relatively standardised and this second, more targeted document seems to be more in line with the anticipated formula, containing an opening address, identifying the petitioners and with a clear statement of the grievance or difficulty, then finally the request for redress and appeal for remedy.5 This last is set out much more clearly in the cartulary document, allowing those who might approve the petition to merely copy the request.
The petition as it appears in the Cartulary (ref: CMAY/3/1/2, f.176)
As the legal instrument through which the Northern merchants sought to defend their rights and privileges in trade abroad, it is an important document in the history of the Company. Its inclusion in the York merchants’ Cartulary alongside the King’s response has preserved both pieces for posterity, allowing us to examine the role of regional and national tensions within international trade at this time. Indeed, these Borthwick documents are of even more fundamental importance as sadly almost no petitions have survived in our national records for the second half of the fifteenth century.6 This York episode therefore gives us an insight, otherwise lacking into the petition process during the second part of Edward IV’s reign.
The Expenses Roll of William Tod Master of the York Mercers 1477-78
Looking at the York mercers petition of 1478 raises the question who wrote the petition or perhaps more appropriately who instigated the petition. In order to answer this question another document in the Borthwick collection is of assistance, being the Expenses Roll of the Masters of the York Mercers. Normally a master was appointed for a term of one year and the roll entries give details of the expenses incurred during that year.
The pertinent year for these purposes is 1477-78 whilst one William Tod was master, it is perhaps no surprise that he had a reputation as ‘a disputatious man’.7 Interestingly his expenses, which are also transcribed by Sellers, reveal that he specifically spent money on counsel or advice concerning the York mercers’ privileges in Brabant, Zeeland and Flanders, and the London mercer John Pickering.8 This gives us some valuable insights into the preparation of the petition. Most importantly, the expenses reveal that at least one of York’s MPs, one Robert Amyas, also a merchant, was involved. He was specifically paid to write and deliver a document (‘carta’), almost certainly the petition to the King’s chancellery in London. We know that in November 1477 Edward IV called a parliament, the first in some years, for the February of 1478, which would seem to indicate the York mercers were preparing to petition parliament, or at least those who might be gathered together in London at the time of parliament, when it might be equally appropriate to petition king and council. In addition, money was spent on alerting the two most prominent local nobles, Richard Duke of Gloucester and Henry Duke of Northumberland, alongside messengers being sent to their fellow merchants in the neighbouring towns of Beverley and Hull presumably to keep them informed. Master Tod’s expenses thus provide evidence of the background activity to the preparation of the petition, which supports the likelihood of his being one of, if not the main instigator.
The account roll, 1477/78 (ref: CMAY/2/2/16)
However, what becomes even more striking on further investigation of the personalities involved, is that Tod had actually been involved in an earlier merchant petition which involved merchants from other cities around the country concerned about the activities of the Hanse merchants and their seemingly preferential treatment. This separate petition, ten years earlier, in 1468 had been led by the previous Duke of Northumberland, a number of named northern merchants, including William Tod and some of his close associates on the Mayor’s Council in York and among the mercers. In fact, three of them, Thomas Wrangwish, John Tong and John Ferriby form a tight trio succeeding one another both as mayor of the City of York and as Master of the Mercers, in addition the 1468 York MP Robert Amyas was also a petitioner. We are fortunate in that the Hanse documents and archive present a very complete picture of these events and the petition which went to Edward IV asking for his intervention.9 It is a complicated history which involves both witness statements from those involved and lobbying from heads of state and civic and mercantile interests all around Europe. The point being that the petition or complaint submitted on this earlier occasion was asking the king to take very strong action against the Hanse merchants trading in England. Indeed, as requested there was initially a royal judgement which led to the confiscation of Hanse goods and the detention of Hanse merchants in England. Given this result when faced with the problem with John Pickering, the experience of the 1468 petition doubtless indicated to many of the same characters still involved in the York mercers a fast and productive route to royal attention and justice.
M. T. Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record (Wiley-Blackwell, 2013),103. ↩︎
Dodd, Gwilym. Justice and Grace. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007, 281. ↩︎
Gwilym Dodd, ‘Parliamentary Petitions? The Origins and Provenance of the ‘Ancient Petitions’ (SC 8) in the National Archives,’ in Medieval Petitions: Grace and Grievance, ed. W. M. Ormrod, G. Dodd & A. Musson (York Press, 2009) this whole chapter traces the rather tortuous history of how the petition documentation suffered various nineteenth century rearrangements, not all positive, at one stage there is mention of ‘a great number of petitions for Edward 1V’s reign’ ( p.21), but sadly these do not seem to have surfaced in the current SC8 or elsewhere. ↩︎
Sellers, Maud. The York Mercers,74-80. The transcriptions of the petition documents are accessible on- line, 74-80, at https://archive.org/details/yorkmercersmerch00mercrich/page/74/mode/2up ↩︎
Walter Stein, ‘Hansisches Urkundenbuch Neunter Band 1463-1470 (Vol 9).’ In Hansisches Urkundendbuch, by various, 1-795. (Verlag von Duncker & Humblot,1903). Accessed at https://www.hansischergeschichtsverein.de/file/hub9_hq.pdf ↩︎
Written by Helen Watt, Honorary Fellow, Department of History, University of York
On Wednesday, 25 March 2026, the enthronement or installation of the new Archbishop of Canterbury will take place in Canterbury Cathedral. This will be both a solemn and truly momentous ceremony, as the Rt Rev. and Rt Hon. Dame Sarah Mullally will be the first woman to serve as archbishop, and the 106th incumbent since St Augustine came from Rome to England in 597 as the very first Archbishop of Canterbury. In the past, the ceremony was known as the enthronement; the new archbishop will first be enthroned or installed in the Cathedral Chair (or Cathedra) as the Diocesan Bishop of the See of Canterbury, as the leading diocese in the English church, then in the Chair of St Augustine (or St Augustine Cathedra) as Primate of All England or leading cleric. The archbishop of Canterbury will swear allegiance to the King, Head of the Church of England, and is one of two archbishops in England, Canterbury and York, each with jurisdiction over their Province, consisting of several dioceses, in turn administered by a bishop. The archbishop of Canterbury takes precedence over the archbishop of York and also leads the Anglican church across the world.
Present-day enthronement or installation
This ceremony follows a lengthy process of selection and approval of Dame Sarah’s candidacy, now involving nomination by theCrown Nominations Commission and submission of her name as nominated candidate by the Prime Minister to the King, for his approval. In legal terms, the process for the appointment of an archbishop is very similar to the acts for confirmation of election of a bishop (see below). The Crown normally appoints a bishop or archbishop by congé d’élire, a licence to the dean and chapter of the relevant cathedral to elect a new bishop or archbishop, and letters missive, a document containing the name of the individual to be elected. Following receipt of which, the dean and chapter elect the new bishop within a certain time and certify the election to the Crown. Confirmation and investiture will then take place, also consecration, but this last step does not usually apply to an archbishop, as they will generally already be a consecrated bishop. The Crown then notifies the appointment of the new archbishop to the other archbishop (of York) and two or four bishops within or without the realm. The final stages of the appointment, consisting of the enthronement (as opposed to the installation of a bishop), restoration of the temporalities, the secular lands and possessions pertaining to the see, and homage to the sovereign closely match those of the final stages of appointment of a bishop. The one proviso that is different is that a new archbishop must be at least thirty years old.[1]
Full details of all stages in the present-day procedure have been posted on the website of the Church of England. After her nomination was confirmed, Dame Sarah’s formal election as archbishop took place on 25 November 2025 at Canterbury Cathedral, and this event is described on that institution’s website. Confirmation of the election followed on Wednesday, 28 January 2026 at St Paul’s Cathedral in London with a special service held there. As might be expected, news of the forthcoming installation, a final stage in her appointment, has also appeared on the website of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Where can we find details of past enthronements?
Therefore, in our times, it is very easy to discover all the steps leading up to the day on which an archbishop-elect takes on their new role. Despite access to all this information, where would we find similar details of past enthronements, as they were known historically? The answer is that we would have to search the written registers of the archbishop in the first place. In the case of the archbishops of York, this process has been greatly facilitated by the conservation and digitisation of the original parchment registers from 1225 to 1650, during the ‘Archbishops’ Registers Revealed’ Project, generously funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The York Registers are held in the diocesan archive, now at the Borthwick Institute for Archives, at the University of York. High-quality images of the original manuscripts and a searchable database of entries can be accessed here: York Archbishops’ Registers. Following this major project two further projects have indexed the registers between 1304 and 1405, and between 1576-1650, funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council and Marc Fitch Fund respectively.
First part of the register of Archbishop William Melton, 1317-1340
Can we find details of the enthronement of Archbishops in the York Archbishops’ Registers, or elsewhere, and if so, what do they tell us?
The table below shows the scanty results of searching the indexed York archbishops’ registers for the term ‘enthronement’, with brief details of entries. Out of the eight serving fourteenth-century archbishops registers, there are only general references to the enthronement of four, and none relating to the actual event itself, so that from 1373 onwards, there is no mention of the ceremony.
Archbishop
Reference
Date
Notes
Greenfield, Mr William de
Reg. 7, fol. 279r, entry 1
1306, 15 Jul.
Marginal note reads: ‘after the enthronement’
Greenfield, Mr William de
Reg. 7, fol. 64v, entry 1
1306, 18 Aug.
Entry mentions provisions for the archbishop’s enthronement
Melton, William de
Reg. 9A, fol. 7r, entry 4
1318, 22 Jan.
Invitation to celebrate the enthronement
Melton, William de
Reg. 9A, fol. 7r, entry 5
1318, 22 Jan. [inferred]
Invitation to celebrate the enthronement
Melton, William de
Reg. 9A, fol. 7r, entry 2
1318, 22 Jan.
Invitation to celebrate the enthronement
Melton, William de
Reg. 9A, fol. 7r, entry 3
1318, 22 Jan.
Invitation to celebrate the enthronement
Melton, William de
Reg. 9A, fol. 7r, entry 6
1318, 27 Jan.
Letter to assist in preparations for the enthronement
Zouche, Mr William de la
Reg. 10, fol. 267v, entry 1
1342, 17 Nov.
Entry mentions works necessary for the enthronement
Zouche, Mr William de la
Reg. 10, fol. 267v, entry 6
1343, 9 Feb.
Entry mentions the archbishop’s recent enthronement
Thoresby, Mr John de
Reg. 11, fol. 12r, entry 7
1353, 8 Oct.
Entry records event after the archbishop’s enthronement
Neville, Mr Alexander de
–
–
Arundell, Mr Thomas
–
–
Waldby, Mr Robert de
–
–
Dead by 6 Jan. 1398
Skirlaw, Mr Walter de
–
–
Election set aside by translation of Scrope from see of Coventry and Lichfield
Scrope, Mr Richard de
–
–
Entry from Register 7, fol. 64v, mentioning provisions for the archbishop’s enthronement, 1306
If there is so little evidence, where do we look for more information?
For the archbishops of York, a further search could be made in the Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1300-1541[2] resulting in the details below.
Name
Dates
Date of Enthronement
Source
Notes
Greenfield, Mr William de
1304-1315
–
–
Melton, William de
1316-1340
1318, 26 Feb.
II, pp. 415-16
Zouche, Mr William de la
1340-1352
1342, 8 Dec.
BL, Cotton Vittellius, A.ii, ff. 112, 122
Thoresby, Mr John de
1352-1373
1354, 8 Sep.
II, p. 420
In error for 1353? (see the table above).
Neville, Mr Alexander de
1373-1388
1374, 18 Dec.
II, p. 422
Arundell, Mr Thomas
1388-1396
1389, 25 Mar.
II, p. 425
Waldby, Mr Robert de
1396-1397 or 8
–
–
Dead by 6 Jan. 1398
Skirlaw, Mr Walter de
[1398]
–
–
Election set aside by translation of Scrope from see of Coventry and Lichfield
Scrope, Mr Richard de
1398-1405
–
–
The main source for the new information is taken from The Historians of the Church of York and its Archbishops, ed. J. Raine, Rolls Series 72, 3 vols (London, 1879-1894), Volume II, relying on details from the following chronicles:
Chronica Pontificum Ecclesiae Eboracensis, Pars Prima, Auctore Anonymo, p. 312.
Chronica Pontificum Ecclesiae Eboracensis, Pars Secunda, Continuatio Chronicae de Vitis Archiepiscoporum Eboracensium per Thomam Stubbs, Dominicanum, ut fertur, Conscripta, p. 388.
Chronica Pontificum Ecclesiae Eboracensis, Pars Tertia, Auctore Anonymo, p. 422.
There are now entries for two more of the archbishops although the date given for Thoresby may be in error, as shown by an entry in the York Archbishops’ Registers noted above. Despite providing exact dates of enthronement for five archbishops, details for others in the early and late fourteenth century are still wanting.
Can we compare such details with similar information from Fasti for the enthronement of Archbishops of Canterbury?[3]
The table below shows dates of enthronements for six of the ten fourteenth-century serving archbishops, but no other sources except the registers are given. Again, entries are wanting for the later fourteenth century.
Name
Dates
Date of Enthronement
Source
Notes
Reynolds, Walter
1313-1327
1314, 17 Feb.
Reg. Reynolds, f. 4
Meopham, Mr Simon de
1327-1333
1329, 22 Jan.
Reg. Q., f. 134
Stratford, Mr John de
1333-1348
1332, 9 Oct.
Reg. Q., f. 201
Bradwardine, Mr Thomas de
[1348]
–
–
Elected, but set aside by provision of Offord
Offord, Mr John de
1348-1349
–
–
Died before consecration
Bradwardine, Mr Thomas de
1349
–
–
Died a few days after restoration of temporalities
Islip, Mr Simon
1349-1366
–
–
Edington, William de
[1366]
–
–
Refused archbishopric
Langham, Simon
1366-1368
1367, 25 Mar.
Reg. Langham, p. 115
Wittlesey, Mr William
1368-1374
1369, 17 Jun.
Reg. Wittlesey, f. 76
Langham, Simon
[1374]
–
–
Second election
Sudbury, Mr Simon de
1375-1381
1376, 6 Apr.
Reg. Sudbury, f. 13
Courtenay, Mr. William
1381-1396
–
–
Arundell, Mr Thomas
1396-1397
–
–
Walden, Roger de
1397-1399
–
–
Arundell, Mr Thomas
1399-1414
–
–
Archbishopric restored
The Pallium
One explanation for the scarcity of recording of enthronement of an archbishop might be that medieval archbishops received their authority directly from the Pope, symbolised in the pallium, a Y-shaped ecclesiastical vestment, still seen in the coat of arms of the diocese of Canterbury. The archbishop’s authority was not confirmed until he had received this vestment from the Pope and professed obedience to him. Therefore, it might be possible that consistent recording of the bestowal of the pallium was of great importance and perhaps more important that consistent recording of the enthronement.
To test this theory, a further search of the registers and the Fasti was made and the results for the archbishops of York appear below.
Name
Date
Source
Notes
Greenfield, Mr William de
1304, 23 Dec.
CCR 1302-1307, p. 313
Royal permission for archbishop-elect to go to Roman Curia
Greenfield, Mr William de
1306, 8 Feb.
CPL II 7
Papal confirmation of election
Melton, William de
1317, 28 Sep.
CPL II 165
Papal confirmation of election
Melton, William de
n.d., ?1317
CPL II 165
Pallium assigned
Zouche, Mr William de la
–
–
Thoresby, Mr John de
1352, Nov.
Reg. 11, fol. 1v, entry 1
Notarial instrument for the proctors seeking the pallium from the Pope
Thoresby, Mr John de
1352, 5/8 Nov.
CPL III 469, Reg. 11, fol. 1b
Pallium despatched
Thoresby, Mr John de
1352, 9 Nov.
Reg. 11, fol. 2r, entry 2
Letter excusing himself from going to receive pallium in person, sending proctors
Thoresby, Mr John de
1353, 4 Jan.
Reg. 11, fol. 5Ar, entry 1
Papal confirmation to two bishops of the grant of the pallium; return of proctor with the pallium; mandate to the bishops to receive the oath of the archbishop-elect to the Roman see
Thoresby, Mr John de
1353, 29 Mar.
R.S.A.
Pallium received
Neville, Mr Alexander de
1374, 10 Oct.
Reg. 12, fol. 1b
Pallium despatched and bestowed through the Bishop of Durham [and Bishop of Rochester]
Neville, Mr Alexander de
1374
Reg. 12, fol. 1v, entry 1
Certification to the Pope of receipt of the pallium, following Papal bull dated 12 Jul 1374, and oath sworn to Roman See
Arundell, Mr Thomas
n.d, 1388 or 1389
II, p. 425
Pallium bestowed at Cambridge
Waldby, Mr Robert de
1396, 6 Oct.
CPL IV 543
Pallium despatched
Skirlaw, Mr Walter de
–
–
Scrope, Mr Richard de
1398, 22 Mar.
CPL V 169, II, p. 429
Pallium assigned, to be bestowed at the end of June 1398
Sources:
CCR Calendar of Close Rolls
CPL Calendar of Papal Letters
R.S.A. Stubbs, W., Registrum Sacrum Anglicanum (Oxford, 1897)
Notarial instrument for the proctors seeking the pallium from the Pope, 1352
It is striking that these results show that in the fourteenth century, there are entries relating to the pallium or papal authority for all the archbishops of York except for one and four entries relating to pallium in the registers alongside nine from other sources.
The results for York may now be compared with a similar search of entries in Fasti for the archbishops of Canterbury:
Name
Dates
Date
Source
Notes
Reynolds, Walter
1313-1327
n.d. [1314]
R.S.A.
Pallium bestowed through Bishop of Worcester
Meopham, Mr Simon de
1327-1333
1328, 6 Jan.
CPR 1327-1330, p. 199
Licence to go to Roman Curia
Meopham, Mr Simon de
1327-1333
1328, between June/Sept.
Reg. Q, fol. 127b
Pallium bestowed
Stratford, Mr John de
1333-1348
1334, 23 Apr.
R.S.A.
Pallium bestowed through Bishop of Rochester
Bradwardine, Mr Thomas de
[1348]
–
–
Elected, but set aside by provision of Offord
Offord, Mr John de
1348-1349
–
–
Died before consecration
Bradwardine, Mr Thomas de
1349
–
–
Died a few days after restoration of temporalities
Islip, Mr Simon
1349-1366
1350, 25 Mar.
R.S.A.
Pallium bestowed through Bishop of Norwich
Edington, William de
[1366]
Refused archbishopric
Langham, Simon
1366-1368
1366, 4 Nov.
Reg. Langham, pp. 112-13
Pallium bestowed through Bishop of Bath and Wells
Wittlesey, Mr William
1368-1374
1369, 19 Apr.
Reg. Wittlesey, fol. 7b
Pallium bestowed through Bishop of Winchester
Langham, Simon
[1374]
–
–
Second election
Sudbury, Mr Simon de
1375-1381
–
–
Courtenay, Mr William
1381-1396
1382, 6 May
Reg. Courtenay, fol. 9b
Pallium bestowed
Arundell, Mr Thomas
1396-1397
1397, 10 Feb.
R.S.A.
Pallium bestowed
Walden, Roger de
1397-1399
1398, 17 Feb.
R.S.A.
Pallium bestowed
Arundell, Mr Thomas
1399-1414
–
–
Archbishopric restored
Sources:
R.S.A. Stubbs, W., Registrum Sacrum Anglicanum (Oxford, 1897)
CPR Calendar of Patent Rolls
For the fourteenth century, there are four entries from registers alongside six from other sources, and again, references to all but one archbishop appear.
If we compare these results in more detail, it becomes clear that there are several more references to bestowal of the pallium on fourteenth-century archbishops in all sources than there are to general or exact references to their enthronement, although information is not complete for all archbishops over the century.
Ceremony
Register entries
Other Sources
Total
No. of Archbishops
Enthronement: York
4
2
6
6 out of 8
Pallium: York
4
9
13
7 out of 8
Enthronement: Cant.
6
0
6
6 out of 10
Pallium: Cant.
4
6
10
9 out of 10
These details suggest, indeed, that if the bestowal of the pallium was more important than enthronement, then perhaps the enthronement was not regularly recorded in the registers. The search may have to be extended to other sources, such as records created by the dean and chapter of Canterbury and York, which would enlarge the survey.[4]
If we extend the search in Fasti to York in the fifteenth century, there is evidence for the pallium for four of the six archbishops, and in the sixteenth century to 1544, of the four archbishops, only for Wolsey. Lee, archbishop between 1531-44, would possibly have been the last to receive it. For the fifteenth century, of the five archbishops of Canterbury (excluding the restoration of Arundell), there are entries relating to pallium for four; only excluding Morton. In the sixteenth century, of three archbishops (excluding one who died before his translation was complete), entries exist relating to all three, including Cranmer (archbishop between 1533-1553), who would have been the last to receive it in that Province.
Acts for the confirmation of the election of a bishop
The process of electing a new bishop and the confirmation of that election, leading to his or her consecration, induction, installation and enthronement, is strictly defined under ecclesiastical law and consists of several stages, as follows:[5]
1. The Crown normally appoints a bishop by congé d’élire, a licence to the dean and chapter of the relevant cathedral to elect a new bishop, and letters missive, a document containing the name of the individual to be elected.
2. The dean and chapter elect the new bishop within a set period and certify the election to the Crown.
3. The Crown signifies the election to the relevant archbishop requiring him to confirm the election and consecrate the individual elected.
4. Confirmation of the election consists of several stages, comprising many elements of ecclesiastical court proceedings:
If confirmation of election proceedings for a bishop of a diocese within the Province of York are to take place within the Province of Canterbury, for example, in the Court of Arches in London, then the archbishop of Canterbury will issue a licence to the archbishop of York permitting him to do so, as was the case with the confirmation of election of Richard Barnes in 1577 (fol. 15v)
The archbishop may preside himself or commission his vicar-general to perform all acts for carrying out the confirmation
The vicar-general issues a citation to opposers to the election to appear at a given time and in a given place to make their objections known (normally, none appear)
At the time and place appointed, the proctor for the dean and chapter
exhibits the Royal assent, commission from the archbishop to the vicar-general and his proxy from the dean and chapter
presents the elected bishop
returns the citation
calls any opposers three times (and certifies the citation)
declares any opposers contumacious and proceeds with the business
then presents a summary petition or libel of the process of election and assent and desires a time to prove it, which is admitted and decreed by the vicar-general
exhibits again the Royal assent, also the elected bishop’s assent and a certificate to the archbishop, requesting a time for a final or definitive sentence, which is decreed by the vicar-general
calls any opposers again three times
declares them contumacious
requests the decree to proceed to a final sentence by a schedule read and published by the vicar-general
the archbishop may also issue letters testimonial of the process of confirmation of election
The elected bishop takes the oath of supremacy (now the oath of allegiance) and the oath of obedience to the archbishop and makes the declaration against simony
the vicar-general reads and subscribes the sentence.
The bishop is then consecrated by the archbishop with the assistance of two (or possibly more) bishops on a Sunday or Holy day (again, if the consecration is to take place within the Province of Canterbury, the archbishop of Canterbury may issue a licence that it may do so). When elected, confirmed, consecrated and having requested that his (or now her) temporalities be restored by the Crown, the new bishop is then installed. The archbishop issues a mandate for the bishop’s induction, installation and enthronement and after a service in the cathedral, the bishop receives the obedience of the dean and chapter in the chapter house. The bishop is then entitled to restoration of all spiritualities and temporalities of the see from the Crown and does homage to the Crown.
This process is clearly seen in Register 31 of the Archbishops of York (1576-1630), which records acts for the confirmation of the election of six bishops:
1.
Richard Barnes
bishop of Durham
1577
fols 12v–21r
2.
John May
bishop of Carlisle
1577
fols 41r–44r
3.
William Chaderton
bishop of Chester
1579
fols 55r–59r
4.
Matthew Hutton
bishop of Durham
1589
fols 114v–118r
5.
Richard Senhouse
bishop of Carlisle
1624
fols 231v–237r
6.
Francis White
bishop of Carlisle
1626
fols 275r–282r
The procedure followed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is generally that outlined above, with documents from each stage of the election and its confirmation entered into the register, but with some variations. For example, other documents might include a petition of the dean and chapter to the elected bishop that he consent to their election of him, such as, for example, that of the dean and chapter of Carlisle Cathedral to John May to consent to their election of him as bishop in 1577 (fol. 43r), as well as their notification of the election to the archbishop of York (fol. 43v). Also, the bishop-elect might issue a document containing his formal consent to his election, for instance, Francis White’s notarial instrument of his consent to his election as bishop of Carlisle (fol. 280v).
Footnotes
[1] See Ecclesiastical Law (reprinted from Halsbury’s Laws of England) 3rd ed. (London, 1957), p. 61, from which these notes are drawn.
[2] ‘Archbishops of York’, in Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1300-1541: Volume 6, Northern Province (York, Carlisle and Durham), ed. B Jones (London, 1963), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/fasti-ecclesiae/1300-1541/vol6/pp3-5 [accessed 10 January 2026]. Many thanks to Dr David Lepine for his suggestions as to where to look for further information.
[3] The details in this table are taken from ‘Archbishops of Canterbury’, in Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1300-1541: Volume 4, Monastic Cathedrals (Southern Province), ed. B Jones (London, 1963), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/fasti-ecclesiae/1300-1541/vol4/pp3-5 [accessed 10 January 2026].
[4] For example, York Minster, Archives and Manuscripts, Chapter Act Books, CY/ZC/H/1/2, 1343-68, CY/ZC/H/1/1, c. 1345-1353, or in other records, such as CY/ZC/M/2/1f, which includes Chapter Act material, 1359-1485. Many thanks also to Dr. David Lepine for his suggestions on this subject.
[5] See Ecclesiastical Law (reprinted from Halsbury’s Laws of England) 3rd ed. (London, 1957), pp. 74-8, from which the following notes are drawn.
Written by Simon Batchelor, BA (Hons), MA, MA (Res), Customer Services Assistant at the University of York Library.
One item in the rare books collection has recently caught my attention; drawn in the corner of the an endpaper is the picture of a youth, standing on one leg, he is holding a horse collar up to his neck and has placed his head into it, his face is distorted with a wide grin or grimace – the title of this drawing is “Gurning through a horse collar”.
‘Gurning through a horse collar’ – Cooper Abbs 1.4.15
Gurning is the art of pulling faces and a world championship is held at the Egremont Crab Fair each September. The competitors place their heads in a horse collar and distort their faces in order to produce the most grotesque possible. Competitors are not allowed to use their hands to assist them in this, which may explain the use of the horse collar. The collar is a heavy affair made of leather and straw making it too weighty to be rested on the (human) neck alone.
The drawing is one of several illustrating ‘Upton’s life and adventures’, these include an illustration of a recumbent man, wearing a nightshirt and cap, with a candle at his head and foot. This may represent the eponymous Upton, either laid out following his death (hence the candles) or merely asleep. Above the recumbent man are drawings which seem to represent a well dressed huntsman, a more rustic man in a wide brimmed hat, an elderly man reading a newspaper (he may be part of the death watch, a group of friends of the deceased who watched over the body at night to ensure that the deceased was truly dead and to ensure that the corpse was not stolen) and our gurning youth. Each appears in his own suitably entitled vignette and these presumably illustrate the life of the recumbent man.
Cooper Abbs 1.4.15
The book in which these drawings appear was published in Edinburgh in 1774, by Messrs J. Bell and W. Creech, and was owned by Mr Bryan Cooper Abbs (1771-1850). It would seem that Mr. Abbs may well have been the artist himself, as he has also used the pages to practice his signature.
Cooper Abbs 1.4.15
Why then did the illustration of the gurning youth catch my eye? I remember seeing Gurning on television (yes it was a televised sport usually on regional news and magazine shows) as a child and I became re-acquainted with it while studying folklore at the University of Sheffield, because of this I realised that this was an early illustration of the practice.
Although now confined, largely, to Cumbria it is possible that gurning was once a widespread tradition in northern England, indeed the owner of our volume lived most of his life in and around Monkwearmouth in County Durham. According to the website of the Egremont Crab Fair, the first reference to gurning was in an edition of the Cumberland Packet of 1852 where it was described as “an ancient tradition”.
The website also states that at this time it was known as a “grinn for tobacco” and that this suggests that the sporting tradition began in the 17th century as a way to win a supply of tobacco, “the use of which had by then spread throughout society.” It is unclear when the horse collar was introduced but our drawing could push this element back to the late 18th century.
Whilst our illustration may represent the earliest reference to gurning through a horse collar there are much earlier visual references to people pulling faces, many inhabit the churches and cathedrals of Europe. Generally described as grotesques, mouth-pullers, grinners and tongue stickers these carved figures stare at us from corbels, the capitals of columns, roof bosses and pendules. Like the modern gurner their faces are distorted, jaws are pushed forward or sideways, tongues are stuck out towards the chin or to one side of the mouth, teeth are bared and eyes are rolled. The only difference being that they also use their hands to aid their facial manipulations.
It is not possible to say that gurners have a direct connection with their medieval counterparts but they do share similarities, and not just in their physical similarities; The word “gurn” is a dialect term from northern England and southern Scotland meaning “To show or gnash the teeth in rage or scorn; To look savage; To distort the countenance”. This would seem to describe both the medieval sculptures and the modern gurner equally well.
Unfortunately there is no generic term for the medieval sculptural forms, they are generally known as grotesques, or by the terms I have used above, but Trubshaw has suggested that they should perhaps, in Leicestershire at least, be referred to as “Mawmers”. This is derived from a Leicestershire dialect term “Mawming” – to make faces. However there is perhaps a better word which describes both the medieval carvings and the modern gurner, “Mumpers”.
Although these days it is associated more with begging (one of its many dialectal meanings) “Mumping” has connotations with both gurning and mawming. In the Border Counties it can mean “To make grimaces, to screw up the face” whilst in northern England, particularly the old Danelaw Counties, it can mean “To strike the face, particularly the mouth” (If anyone is unsure why this definition is relevant watch a fist fight in any old school cartoon).
Furthermore the word survives in modern usage: Were you asked the name for the highly contagious viral infection which causes swelling of the salivary glands and the face to swell and distort you would of course answer… the mumps.
The Cooper Abbs Collection is a family library started by the Reverend Cooper Abbs of Monkwearmouth (1738-1800) and added to by his descendants.
The books give an insight into the social history of a well to do North Eastern family library. The library is predominantly of the 18th-century, and contains literature, history including Ancient and European, reference books including dictionaries and grammars, and some theology.
All the books are catalogued and available for study. Please contact sarah.griffin@york.ac.uk for more information
‘Not a dry eye was to be seen, and the dreadful shrieks and sobs of the bereaved widows and the fatherless, in passing the habitations of the sufferers, were such, as to beggar all description – truly it was the scene of desolation’ (Yorkshire Gazette)
Shortly after one in the afternoon of the 26th December 1833 a party of church singers departed Stillingfleet with instructions from the vicar, Rev. David Markham, to sing the “Christmas Hymn” to the wealthier farmers and townspeople of neighbouring settlements. Of the 14 in the party that set out, 11 would be dead by nightfall. What befell them would quickly garner national notoriety as the “Stillingfleet Tragedy”.
We can establish what happened to the singers that day through the witness testimonies given at the subsequent coroner inquest (reported at length in local newspapers), and from a handful of parish records now held at the Borthwick Institute. These latter records include a contemporary account of the tragedy transcribed into a Baptism Register in 1890 (PR/STIL/121); a set of church notes written towards the turn of the 20th century by the then vicar, Canon A Grimston (PR/STIL/49); and an 1896 manuscript history of the parish of Stillingfleet written by Sir Clements Markham, a relative of the incumbent at the time of the incident (PR/STIL/48).
The transcribed account of the accident, recorded in a later Baptism Register [PR/STIL/121]
For Canon Grimston the tragedy which struck Stillingfleet that day in 1833 was ‘perhaps the saddest in all its history’. The party of singers, requiring transportation to the outlying townships, assembled in a boat belonging to one of the party, the fisherman John Turner, and proceeded along the River Ouse to Moreby and Acaster Selby. At approximately 4:30 in the afternoon they sought to disembark near the Stillingfleet Landing to advance on foot to Kelfield. It was at that point that they encountered the coal-laden barge Perseverance being towed upstream by a horse on the riverbank. Confusion as to how to pass the barge ensued and, within a matter of moments, they became caught in the tow rope. Turner’s boat capsized and its passengers were pitched into the cold waters of the Ouse. Two men, John Fisher and Richard Toes, were pulled from the water by the bargemen whilst another, George Eccles, ‘saved himself by swimming, supported by the oars of the boat’.
For the remaining 11 passengers there was no deliverance. They were buried together under a churchyard monument paid for by a local landowner, Mr Bielby Thompson of Escrick. The Burial Register (PR/STIL/13), recording their burials on 29 December, noted their names and ages as William Bristow, 55; Thomas Webster, 44; Clarissa Sturdy, 17; Elizabeth Buckles, 15; John Turner, 55; Jane Turner, 16; Christopher Spencer, 36; Henry Spencer, 44; Elizabeth Spencer, 14; Sarah Spencer, 16; and Sarah Eccles, 16. Tragically the entries for Sarah Spencer and Sarah Eccles noted that they had been ‘accidentally drowned and not yet found’. They never were.
The Burial Register entries for Sarah Spencer and Sarah Eccles [PR/STIL/13]
A transcription of the memorial inscription to those lost in the tragedy [PR/STIL/48]
An Inquest was hastily arranged for the following day, Friday 27 December, at the local White Swan Inn. It was here that the principal witnesses in the case, including the three survivors George Eccles, John Fisher, and Richard Toes, and the barge’s hauling man, Stephen Green, gave evidence. Eccles informed the jury that he and Fisher had been rowing the boat to position their vessel on the off-side of the barge but that John Turner had instructed them to keep to the inside channel. They defended their actions by stating that ‘Turner was accustomed to the river, being a fisherman, and it being his boat, we complied with his directions’. Stephen Green reported that he heard shouts from the boat to slacken the tow rope, something Eccles corroborated, so as to allow the smaller vessel to pass over it. The speed of the current however prevented the rope from sinking, forcing John Fisher to attempt to lift the rope over their heads:
‘I saw danger, and caught hold of the line, and lifted it up, in order to clear it from the boat, and throw it over our heads. In consequence of the boat running down so very fast, the line caught hold of the side of the boat, and threw her over, and we were all instantly pitched into the river’
He and Toes survived by holding onto the rope. Eccles, who held on to one of the oars, saw the boat rolling over several times before it passed out of sight downstream. Some of the victims were found shortly afterwards but others ‘were found one by one, washed up at different places during the succeeding days’. The inquest made clear the fortitude of those involved in the search parties:
‘The men employed in dragging for the bodies worked incessantly until after dark last night, when they discontinued their search…too much praise cannot be bestowed upon these individuals, whose exertions to find the bodies was great indeed’
In closing the inquest the jury returned a verdict of accidental drowning, with the coal barge being fined a deodand (a forfeiture to the crown in the case of causing death) of 1 shilling.
For those immediately affected by the events it was a horrifying ordeal. Not only were a number of the victims directly related (Henry Spencer was father to Elizabeth and Sarah, and brother to Christopher; the boat owner John Turner was father to Jane; and Sarah Eccles was daughter to George) but the small and closely knit nature of the local community meant that few parishioners were not personally affected. It is likely that many of the jury, who had to inspect the bodies in the homes of the deceased, knew the victims. The impact on the relatives was likewise devastating; the jury noted that the ‘the lamentations of the bereaved relatives broke through the ears with horror’. The repercussions were particularly hard for the Spencer family, with the Yorkshire Gazette reporting that:
‘the disconsolate widow, who has a child at the breast, is left with eight children, and is herself in a delicate state of health, having recently been a patient in the County Hospital’
Yet for historical researchers the tragedy that struck Stillingfleet in 1833 can also provide insights into a world usually obscured by a lack of surviving documentary evidence. We rarely hear the voices of the labouring classes of this period, instead more often than not having to rely on formal and often perfunctory records like the parish registers which were written about, rather than by,them. But in the inquest testimonies we have a rare chance to hear the voices of the individuals involved.
Indeed it is only through their testimonies, delivered only a day after the harrowing affair, that we know the sequence of events that led to disaster. George Eccles reported that he and John Fisher were rowing to get the boat to the off-side of the barge but were countermanded by John Turner. We are similarly informed by Stephen Green that the crew of the boat initially called for him to tighten the rope so as to provide space for them to pass under but he refrained, recognising the danger of sweeping the passengers into the river by doing so. The subsequent call for the rope to be slackened was executed but the strong current prevented it sinking and the efforts to push the rope over the boat were thwarted by its weight. To their credit, the survivors did not apportion blame either to Stephen Green or even to John Turner, perhaps out of respect for their deceased companion.
For modern readers the incident also shines a shocking light on the contemporary lack of safety precautions and prescribed rules which, if followed, would likely have prevented the tragedy. From the outset several factors conspired to doom the parish singers. John Turner’s boat was described as being ‘of rather small dimensions’ and they were battling against strong river currents and a sky that was darkening to the point that ‘it was with difficulty that the towing rope could be seen’. The rowers of the boat, Eccles and Fisher, were not watermen and were ‘quite unacquainted with managing the boat’. Their predicament was only compounded upon the encounter with the barge. Its owner, John Jewitt of York, noted his surprise at the smaller vessel trying to enter the inside channel (‘they ought to have been on the off side’), whilst the hauling man Stephen Green received inaudible and subsequently conflicting demands. John Fisher stated at the Inquest that ‘Turner called out for the rope to be slackened, and he called for it to be tightened’. Ambiguity, confusion, and the ensuing panic sealed the fate of the smaller boat.
We can also interpret the incident within the context of the deepening class structures of the 19th century and the expectations placed on the working populace by their professed “betters”. Many of those who died, including Henry and Christoper Spencer and Thomas Webster, were agricultural labourers, as were the three survivors. Despite the dangers posed by the strong river currents and seasonal weather the vicar still expected them to ‘visit the principal farmers within the parish’ on one of the few days of the year they were free of their labouring obligations. Resentment towards the incumbent was not recorded but may well have been a very understandable reaction among the bereaved families.
The recording of the incident also challenges our assumptions about the accuracy and veracity of historic documents, even those seemingly formal or unbiased in nature. On the one hand we are confronted by clear errors. Despite Sir Clements Markham’s belief that for the parishioners in 1896 ‘it [the tragedy] is as fresh in their mind as if it occurred yesterday’, the oral tradition and the written documents he relied on couldn’t prevent mistakes creeping into his account. He stated for example ‘that every soul was drowned’ in spite of the survival of three of the passengers. The claim that all were lost in the accident was similarly repeated in Canon Grimston’s notes, which also describes the party that set out as being 11; he had originally written 13 but then struck that number through, suggesting confusion between the total size of the party and the number of the deceased.
The account by Sir Clements Markham wrongly claimed that ‘every soul was drowned [PR/STIL/48]
Canon Grimston’s account includes errors such as the total number of passengers in the vessel, the loss of all hands on board, and the belief that the singers were returning from Kelfield rather than heading there [PR/STIL/49]
Moreover we must also recognise that oral testimonies and written records are created by individuals with their own biases and subjective viewpoints which they inadvertently or intentionally seek to impress upon their listeners and readers. As such we must be ever conscious of these narratives and the motivations behind their construction (as well as how those narratives are received and interpreted by subsequent readers and audiences). Despite the unsafe commands issued by John Turner, none of the survivors sought to blame him at the Inquest, perhaps impelled by a wish not to upset relatives and friends who they likely knew in the parish. Similarly Sir Clements Markham’s praising of the actions of the vicar following the tragedy (‘constant and unwearied in his helpfulness and active sympathy’) may reflect the truth or perhaps a wish by a relative to exonerate him from any share of the blame for what transpired that day.
On the one hand the surviving documents help us understand the tragic events that struck the church singers of Stillingfleet on the 26th December 1833. They reveal the names, ages, and professions of the deceased and, through the witness testimonies and later historical accounts, we can piece together the sequence of events which ended in disaster. Yet the records also present us with the realisation that historical documents are never transparent windows into the events of the past. They must instead always be interrogated to understand the nature of their construction, and the obligation is on the researcher to remain vigilant.
‘I want to run over & have a talk with you sometime. I have been feeling more and more lately that I oughtn’t to be here.’ So began the letter that was to change the lives of Lawrence and his mother forever. It was January 1916 and Lawrence had been on active service with the Friends’ Ambulance Unit since the outbreak of war two years earlier. The FAU, a civilian volunteer ambulance service established by Quakers, provided vital medical support to the armed forces in extremely dangerous conditions and Laurie’s famous journal from this time, entitled ‘A Nightmare in Three Acts’, attests to the horrors he and his companions faced from their arrival in Dunkirk in October 1914.
However by early 1915 Laurie was already beginning to have doubts about his vocation. In August 1914 he had written that he would do all he could, and offer himself ‘to what ever relief works are going,’ flatly rejecting the absolutist pacifism of some Quakers who refused to refused to play any part whatsoever in the war effort. ‘Although the horrors it entails are too great to be imagined, & one realises the wickedness of it all, still I consider it would be criminal to stand out & say “you have brought this war on your selves, I will do nothing.” For a medical student the FAU offered an honorable way to make a contribution to the war effort without engaging directly in armed conflict.
In January 1916, with military conscription looming and the war no closer to being won, he admitted to his mother that he was in the FAU rather than in the Army ‘because it was the only place that offered me the work I wanted, not because of my conscience, & I couldn’t go before a tribunal & say I was a conscientious objector.’ He goes on ‘I suppose everyone gets a call of some sort some time. I’ve been getting it for about nine months. I think it started when I met some men coming out of the trenches & I was in the car, but it’s been much stronger lately.’ He had waited ‘because I never felt before that I was really wanted, but now I am sure that I am more wanted there than here… Here am I, healthy & strong, doing work that any woman could do, when there is man’s work waiting.’
We do not have Constance’s reply, but evidently she was as supportive of her son as she could be because Lawrence’s letter the following day begins ‘You really are an absolute brick, & you understand things better than anybody I know.’ He clearly felt great guilt for his decision and its impact on her however, adding ‘I am different to what you want me to be I know. I’m frightfully sorry, because I know it is an awful disappointment to thee, & I have tried to fall in with what you would like, but the call is too strong. It doesn’t go against my conscience: I wish it did, for thy sake, & if it did I would sooner die than do it.’
Lawrence left the FAU the same month and enlisted in the army, just one of hundreds of Quakers to join the armed forces. After training, he returned to France in August 1916, this time as part of ‘C’ company of what would later become known as the Tank Corps. A month later Laurie was part of the first ever deployment of tanks in battle at Flers-Courcelette, part of the Battle of the Somme. His unit’s tank, nicknamed Creme de Menthe (film of the tank can be viewed here), took part in a successful attack on a sugar factory but Laurie was wounded and returned briefly to Britain to convalesce at Edinburgh’s Royal Infirmary where his recent deployment aroused a great deal of curiosity; ‘The old tanks seem to be creating a lot of interest. Nobody knows anything detailed about them & it is amusing to hear some of the extraordinary things they say.’ It was during his time at Edinburgh that Laurie decided to apply for a commission, subsequently becoming a 2nd Lieutenant in the Royal Field Artillery.
His letters from the Front between 1916 and 1917 are frequent and detailed, despite the occasional liberal application of the censor’s black ink. They show his characteristic sense of humour. Of his regular post from York he wrote in 1916: ‘The postal staff have got into the habit of expecting at least one for me every day & they weep bitter tears of disappointment if there isn’t. The record was sustained yesterday by one which arrived in a state of decomposition. In fact it looked as if it had been in a rather bad railway smash & arrived marked ‘died of wounds’. We gave it a decent burial, but no one present recognized the deceased. No inquest.’ In December that year he wrote that ‘Christmas day went off as well as we expected. Luckily we didn’t expect much because we didn’t get much.’ In a letter to his adventurous little sister Jean in early 1917 he simply added the postscript ‘P.S. Whatever you do, don’t.’
These flashes of humour belied the terrible strain of everyday life on the Western Front. Laurie writes of the discomfort of lice, trench foot and having to sleep in a gas mask during his stints in the trenches. After one such duty in August 1917 he wrote that it was ‘blessed peace coming back to a tent & green grass after rabbit warrens & mud & everlasting smell.’ In October he reported that he and his companions had got a gramophone going ‘to try & cheer us up’, expressing the hope that the war would not last out the winter.
However by November he seemed less optimistic, writing of poor weather and how everyone was ‘tired and ill’. On the 8th of that month, after another turn of duty on the front line, he wrote ‘it has been so bad that it was really impossible to write. I have practically done without sleep & altogether done without any sort of a wash.’ On his return to the wagon lines he was knocked down by a car and although it did no serious damage he found it very difficult to walk as a result. He wrote longingly of family Christmases, noting on the 22 December 1916 that ‘they (whoever they are) say that the third time is lucky. This will make the third Yule-tide that I have been absent from the family board so at that rate next year I ought to be there.’
It was not to be. On Friday 30 November 1917, Constance met up with her sister-in-law Isabella. She remarked that she had not heard from Laurie for nearly a week. At the point, Constance said, she did not mind if it was good news or bad news, just so long as there was news. The following morning, she received a telegram: Lawrence Rowntree had been killed during the 3rd Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele) on 25 November 1917, just three months before his 23rd birthday
Over the following weeks Constance received nearly 130 condolence letters. She kept them all tied up in an old writing paper folder. Almost all of the letters commented on Laurie’s kindness and his caring nature. Many remarked on Laurie’s great love for his mother. His housemother from prep school who had recalled Laurie’s first reaction to hearing of his father’s death as being “But who will look after my mother?” imagined that he had had the same reaction upon finding himself in heaven. She was not the only writer to imagine Laurie in heaven. A prominent American Quaker who had known Laurie’s father wrote to Constance: ‘You raised Laurie alone for 12 years. Now it is John’s turn. And when you to ascend unto Heaven, they will be there waiting for you: the man you loved and the man you created together’. Constance’s best friend Winnie took a more practical approach, offering to have the then 12-year-old Jean to stay both immediately or over the upcoming Christmas holidays if it would help. Perhaps the most heartbreaking letter came from one of Constance’s childhood friends. She described Laurie as a kind and thoughtful young man, and she recalled her favourite memory of Laurie when, as a teenager, he had helped his mother host Christmas dinner. She offered her support and prayers. Then, at the bottom of the page, she simply wrote: ‘P.S. We have both now lost three apiece. Let’s not lose any more.’
After receiving news of Laurie’s death his friend Roger Derby drove straight to Constance’s house to retrieve Laurie’s documents as he had promised. He subsequently wrote a series of four letters to Constance from different parts of the country explaining what he had done on Laurie’s behalf. This included selling Laurie’s Cambridge flat and furniture, collecting Tony from a friend’s house in Edinburgh, organising for Laurie’s bank account to be closed, and coordinating with the army for the return of Laurie’s belongings. In the final letter he writes that, with Dorothy’s permission, he has taken one of Laurie’s coats and a pair of gloves, as well as a photo of Laurie and Dorothy together that Laurie kept on his bedside table. He writes ‘I will return them if you would like, but I would so like to have the photo to remember him by.’
Constance wrote to Dorothy, Laurie’s fiancée, immediately after receiving the telegram, but she had already heard the news from Margaret, Laurie’s sister and Dorothy’s roommate. In her reply to Constance, whom she called her ‘other Mother’, she wrote that it was terrible news but not wholly unexpected. She was grateful for the time she and Laurie had had together and thanked Constance for ‘giving me your son, the most precious gift you could bestow,’ adding that she would aim to live a life worthy of Laurie so that when they met again in Heaven he would be proud of her.
Three days letter, Dorothy wrote a second letter. This one read simply:
Dear Other Mother,
This is harder than I thought it would be and I think I need my family around me. Could I come and stay?
Thy Other Daughter.
A letter from Roger confirms that he drove to London to collect her the following morning.
Laurie’s other close friend, Richard, was serving in the trenches at the time and didn’t hear of his death until over a month later. It was only while on leave in Paris that he bumped into an old friend and was told the terrible news. He wrote to Constance immediately, apologising firstly for the delay and secondly for not knowing how to write a condolence letter, yet his letter is one of the most heartfelt that Constance received. He wrote that he frequently imagined life after the war. He daydreamed about returning to Cambridge and completing his medical degree, and envisioned his life beyond Cambridge. He had had many variations on this daydream, but in every single one of them Laurie was there with him. While Richard had considered that he personally might not survive the war, it had never even occurred to him that Laurie might not and he struggled to imagine a future without him.
Richard did survive the war. He did indeed return to Cambridge and complete his studies. Roger also survived the war, despite returning briefly to France. He later invested in the railways, married and had a large family. Dorothy later married the brother of her another school roommate and went on to have two children. Margaret married only a month after Laurie’s death. It’s not clear if Laurie ever met her soon-to-be husband, but hopefully he would have approved of him! Tony also married in 1925. She continued to write through much of her life, and some of her scrapbooks and journals also survive in the Borthwick archives. True to Laurie’s word, they are funny and entertaining, and tell you precisely nothing about what she was actually doing on a day to day basis.
It was Jean, however, who led perhaps the most adventurous life of the remaining siblings. After obtaining a history degree from Somerville College, Oxford, she briefly became a teacher but took a sabbatical in 1938 to help Jews and other vulnerable refugees fleeing the newly Nazi occupied Sudetenland. This was, after all, the girl who had attempted to shoot down zeppelins from the roof of her house with an air rifle. Following her return to England in 1940 Jean joined the BBC. She served as a producer of educational programming for many years, retiring in the 1970s. A great advocate of education for all, she was instrumental in setting up the Open University and received an OBE in 1962. Like Tony, she kept scrapbooks and journals throughout her life. She died in 2003, aged 97.
Constance died in 1928 at the age of 56. True to her friend’s letter, her three remaining children all outlived her.
But let’s not end with death. Instead, let’s end with and extract from my favourite of the letters Laurie wrote. On New Year’s Day 1917 Laurie wrote the following letter to the then 11 year old Jean:
My Dear,
Happy New Year, and much good may it do you. I’m afraid I’ve been an awfully long time answering your letters and thanking you for the soap but I knew you wouldn’t mind my taking them in age order, and that way it takes some time to come round to you. When the only time one gets for writing is half an hour to an hour in the evening.
The soap was most acceptable. Thanks awfully. Also it was in a way a relief to get something that didn’t have to be eaten – at least I suppose some people might have eaten it, but I didn’t. I gave that up at the age of two in favour of more toothsome delicacies.
You warned me not to eat too much turkey. Unnecessary, madam, for there was no turkey to eat. But you didn’t say anything about goose, so I ate too much of that. I got a lump of green stuff with it that I couldn’t make out until it struck me that it must be what they make pate de foie gras out of. Which as a luxury I consider to be overrated, besides entailing a certain amount of cruelty in its production.
You haven’t told me if your heart is yearning particularly over anything in the shape of a Christmas present. If it is, acquaint me with the object. It will have to continue to yearn for a little while I’m afraid, but at the first possible opportunity it shall be procured if money can buy it. That last condition does not necessarily hold true. Don’t request an elephant or anything else of a ridiculous nature…
Those of you based in York may have already heard of Lawrence Edmund Rowntree, the subject of a recent exhibit at York Castle Museum which was covered in the York Press. For those to whom the name is unfamiliar, Lawrence (or Laurie as he was always known) was the son of John Wilhelm and Constance Rowntree, and the grandson of the famous chocolate-maker and philanthropist, Joseph Rowntree. Until now he has been best known for the journal he wrote while serving with the Friends Ambulance Unit during the First World War.
Lawrence Rowntree.
It is this journal that serves as the basis of the Castle Museum exhibit as well as a play based on his early wartime experiences that was performed at the museum in the summer of 2017. However in late 2017 the Borthwick Institute received a gift of more than 600 letters written by Lawrence to his mother Constance Rowntree. These reveal, in his own words, the fascinating story of his upbringing as part of York’s most famous family and his fateful decision to leave the Friends’ Ambulance Unit for active military service which led to his death at Passchendaele at the age of just 22.
Laurie was born in 1895, the only son of John Wilhelm Rowntree, who would himself die young at the age of 37 leaving a widow, Constance, and Laurie and his four sisters Margaret, Antoinette (Tony), Violet (who died aged 3), and Jean. The earliest letter surviving letter from Laurie dates from 1901 when he was just six years old. His parents were away from home, and Laurie wrote to his father to let him know that all the children were safe and happy.
Shortly after this, Laurie and his sister Margaret were sent to live with a local tutor. While Laurie was occasionally persuaded to write to his parents during this time, these letters give the very clear impression that Laurie was relying on Margaret to pass on any important news, although he does proudly report any time their hosts let him drive the horses. One letter to his father gives a glimpse of the kind of education he was receiving. ‘I wrote down all five conjugations in Latin all by myself! Then he [the teacher] told me there are six conjugations. I’m not sure.’
Laurie started at boarding school in 1904. Over the next thirteen years he wrote to his mother at least twice a week. Initially writing from prep school, Laurie continued to write during his years studying at Bootham School in York, his year studying at Haverford College in Pennsylvania, and his brief spell at Cambridge University as a medical student.
Lawrence’s Letters at the Borthwick Institute
Some things remained constant over the thirteen years’ worth of letters. For one, Laurie was forever an athlete. His letters from school relate endless results of football, rugby, cricket, and swimming matches. Each year at Bootham School, each dorm would compete against the other dorms in a variety of sports. Laurie took this competition very seriously and updated his mother on the score after every match. While in America, Laurie attempted to play American football, but quickly decided he would rather support than play. At Cambridge, he joined the rowing team. Even when writing later from the trenches of World War One, he tells Connie about impromptu football games between the men – always being very careful to mention exactly which goals he scored.
Laurie also loved to ‘fix’ things. While in the junior years at Bootham School, Laurie and his friends became fixated with the idea of creating a hydroplane. For over a year, Laurie wrote about this hydroplane in every single letter to his mother. As the letters go on, he continues to explain why it is taking so long and why they need more money for a new part. Finally, Laurie writes that the hydroplane is almost finished and that he and his friends are planning to launch it on the river. He promises to send Constance all the details of exactly what happens, but the hydroplane is never mentioned again. A quick search through the Bootham School Archive revealed that the hydroplane sank as soon as it was put on the water!
While in sixth form, Laurie purchased a motorbike without telling his mother. Again, he decided to try and ‘improve’ the motorbike, with varying levels of success. Eventually he was forced to give up, although a much later letter hints that Constance was now using the motorbike herself, despite her initial disapproval of the machine! Thankfully all this early experience served Laurie well. While serving with the Friends Ambulance Unit, he was using his grandfather’s Daimler car as an ambulance. Unfortunately, the Daimler was not cut out to be driven on such poor or non-existent roads, nor was it used to being driven so regularly. It broke down often, and Laurie was forced to rely on all his earlier engineering experience to keep it going.
Reading these letters, it is also possible to watch Laurie grow up, and nowhere is this more evident than in his sign-off. The early letters are signed ‘Thy very loving little son’ with the word ‘very’ underlined multiple times. When he started secondary school, Laurie dropped the word ‘little’. By the time he had reached sixth form, the ‘very’ had also disappeared. While serving on the western front, Laurie’s letters became quite hurried, and the word ‘loving’ also disappears, leaving simply ‘Thy son.’ However, there is one letter written in early 1917 in which Laurie signs himself ‘Thy very loving little son.’ He then crosses out ‘little’ and adds underneath ‘sorry – nostalgic habit!’
Laurie and his mother were clearly very close. In 1917 the housemother from Laurie’s school would recall that when he was told of his father’s death in March 1905, his first response was ‘But who will look after my mother?’ His letters from school show frequent concern for her health, in one he sends sympathy for her hay fever, adding with concern ‘Please don’t let him cut off your nose, as you said he was going to. I’m sure it will get better without that. And besides, it would hurt.’
Out of his three sisters, Laurie was especially close to his older sister Margaret. Margaret was at the Mount School in York, so as soon as Laurie started at Bootham Margaret arranged regular visits between the two of them. Laurie refers to the two of them visiting relatives together, going for walks around York, or attending social events at each other’s schools. When Margaret began to collect a series of beaus and fiancées, none of them quite met with his approval. In a letter from 1912, he wrote scathingly of Margaret’s latest romantic entanglement. In the next letter, he apologises profusely and takes back all earlier comments. However, on a separate sheet of paper with ‘DO NOT SHOW MARGARET’ written in capitals across the top, he writes that he will make enquiries about this mysterious fiancée (a missionary from Tasmania who none of the family had ever met) amongst other Quakers.
Laurie’s sisters – Jean and Tony
During the war, Margaret moved to London to help with the war effort. While at officer training camp, Laurie couldn’t often get home to Yorkshire, but he did make regular trips to London to visit Margaret. While in France, Laurie didn’t get much time to write letters, but when he did there was a strict order in which he wrote them. Margaret was third after his fiancée and his mother.
Shortly after Margaret left the Mount School, Laurie’s younger sister Tony started there. Now it was Laurie’s turn to organise familial visits. He took Tony to tea in town, as well as to visit the full cohort of nearby relatives. He even put up with what he referred to as her ‘group of giggling girls.’ After Laurie left Bootham, the two siblings began to correspond regularly. The pair of them had seen Peter Pan together as young children, and it had clearly made an impression. They kept a close eye on the career of Pauline Chase (who had played Peter), and often make references to the play in their letters. Laurie wrote from America that he thoroughly enjoyed receiving Tony’s letters; they were funny, well-written, and entertaining, yet managed to tell the reader precisely nothing at all about what was going on in her life.
Tony photographed by Laurie on a family holiday in 1914.
Laurie’s youngest sister was born in 1905. Upon hearing of her birth, Laurie wrote to his mother ‘As I have had opportunity to say twice before – better a girl than none.’ He was clearly delighted at the idea of having another sibling, and suggested that she be called Cello. Perhaps understandably, Constance decided not to name her new baby after a musical instrument, but instead named the child Jean. As a teenager, Laurie complained about having to write to the young Jean, a decade his junior. ‘She’s just so little I don’t know what to say,’ he wrote. While Laurie was in America, the then seven-year-old Jean started to write back to him. Much like Tony’s letters, Laurie wrote that he enjoyed receiving them, but they only spoke of ‘childish nonsense’ and gave him no real news. However, by 1915 it’s clear the siblings were very fond of each other and perhaps the most similar of the four. For her tenth birthday, Jean requested a crossbow. She wanted to be able to shoot down the German zeppelins from the roof of their house. Laurie sent her an air rifle, explaining to his mother that it was simply the duty of older brothers to encourage their younger sisters.
‘Better a girl than none’ – Laurie’s verdict on the birth of Jean.
Popular with his peers, two names feature frequently in Laurie’s letters to his mother: Roger Derby and Richard, whose surname is unfortunately not mentioned. Roger starts to appear in Laurie’s letters very shortly after Laurie arrived at Bootham School. He was a young lad of exactly Laurie’s age, who came from a prominent Quaker family in the south west. The two shared a dorm and were both determined to win the inter-house tournament. Later, when they no longer shared a room, often be entered for all the same events, but were quite happy so long as one of them won. They were clearly close and Roger was often invited to spend the shorter school holidays with Laurie. Aged eighteen, the two of them went on a motorcycling trip of the UK. Unfortunately, they did not get very far before Roger’s motorcycle broke beyond repair and the two were forced to return to Roger’s family in Bristol. The two lost contact for a couple of years after school, but were reunited when they joined the same section of the Friends’ Ambulance Service. It was a happy reunion, and once again news of Roger begins to fill Laurie’s letters. Roger did not join up when Laurie did, but returned to England as a Conscientious Objector. As such, Laurie made Roger the executor for his will, and asked Roger to take care of his family should anything happen to him.
Richard and Laurie became friends while both serving as prefects at Bootham School and became virtually inseparable. They shared both a bedroom and a prefect office. The two stayed close during Laurie’s studies at Haverford in the USA. Despite the 3000 miles between them, Laurie writes news of Richard in pretty much every letter to his mother. When Laurie arrived at Cambridge, Richard was already studying there. He had organised Laurie’s accommodation for him, and introduced him to the local Quaker community. Richard and Laurie were together when the outbreak of war was declared. Constance and Jean were on holiday in Austria at the time, and Laurie and Richard frantically worked with Laurie’s grandfather and Uncle Duncan to get them home safely. Richard stayed on with the family, and he and Laurie took the decision to join the Friends’ Ambulance Service together. Once again, they shared a bedroom. Richard joined the army shortly before Laurie and ended up serving in a different part of France, so the two were separated. However, whenever they were in the vicinity of each other, they always made sure to meet up, and Laurie always describes these meetings with joy.
Constance knew all of Laurie’s acquaintances at least by name. Unfortunately, this makes things rather tricky for the modern reader, as they often refer to people simply by initials. While at prep school, Laurie was forced to share a dorm with a boy named Pumphrey, who Laurie described as ‘quite the softest ass I have ever met.’ The two boys despised each other, and when Pumphrey enrolled at Bootham just a year after Laurie, he does little to hide his disgust. Fortunately, Bootham was a larger school than Colwall, and the two boys were able to largely avoid each other. Many year later, when Laurie joined the Friends’ Ambulance Unit, he was serving under a man known as P. J., who Laurie respected greatly. It in only on the Christmas dinner menu from 1914 signed by all the men of the unit that it becomes clear that P. J. is Pumphrey! It’s nice to know the two boys worked out their differences in the end.
Pumphrey’s signature on the 1914 ‘War Dinner’ menu.
However the most important person in Laurie’s life during this time was Dorothy Cross; Tony’s old roommate and one of the ‘group of giggling girls.’ The two first started a romantic relationship when Laurie was eighteen and Dorothy was fourteen. Like Laurie, Dorothy was an athlete and her name appears on many of the Mount School sports awards from this time. She was also a committed Quaker like Laurie. Their relationship continued throughout Laurie’s time in America and Cambridge. In 1913 Laurie mentioned that Tony had written to him about a party held at the Mount School, noting that Dorothy looked very pretty – ‘As if I didn’t already know that!’
Lawrence and Dorothy.
Dorothy moved to London during the war (she and Margaret shared a house for a while) and briefly assisted with the Red Cross in Belgium. She and Laurie were in constant contact and Dorothy was the first person Laurie wrote to whenever he had spare time. In 1916 he wrote to his mother to request she help him buy ‘an opal ring.’ She had it sent to him and he proposed to Dorothy shortly after while on leave in London. She accepted and the next letter Laurie wrote to Constance was brimming with joy and excitement.
The two initially decided not to marry until after the war. However, many of their friends and acquaintances tried to talk them out of this, and the two wrestled with the idea of marrying while Laurie was on leave. In late 1917, Laurie wrote a letter to his mother while on leave in York. At the end, he briefly writes ‘Mrs L.E. Rowntree sends her love in buckets. Did I tell you we were married this morning?’ However, this is all that Laurie ever writes on the topic, and no marriage certificate has been found, so it remains a mystery!
A few days ago, I was rummaging through a box of wills when I noticed something odd. Amongst the wills of those who died in 1703, and unusually high proportion had died aboard a ship. Closer inspection revealed that each of the thirteen Yorkshire men who died in December 1703 had died on one of five ships. Immediately my curiosity was piqued. I knew that in 1703 England had been embroiled in the War of Spanish Succession. Perhaps there been a disastrous naval battle? However, the answer turned out to be far more prosaic; not a naval battle, but bad weather.
On the afternoon of November 26th 1703[1], Daniel Defoe noticed that the mercury in his barometer had dropped unnaturally low; so low that he assumed that his children had been playing with the instrument and had damaged it. That night southern and central England was hit by an extra-tropical cyclone, unprecedented both in its ferocity and duration. Diarist John Evelyn wrote that the storm was “not to be paralleled with anything happening in our age or in any history.” In London, the damage was extensive. Lightning started fires in both Greenwich and Whitehall, while the wind was so strong that nearly 2000 chimneys were blown down and the lead roofing was blown off Westminster Abbey. Some, fearing that the roofs would collapse above their heads, tried to take shelter outside, only to find that roof tiles were whirling through the air. Those living near St. James’s Park also noticed that fish from the park’s lake had also been swept up by the wind and sent flying. So many roofs were damaged that there were genuinely not enough tiles in England to replace those that had been lost or broken. The damage was not restricted to London. According to Defoe, windmills across the country span so fast that the friction generated caused them to spontaneously combust. The winds in Kent were so fierce that they lifted a cow into a tree. There was also severe and prolonged flooding, especially around Bristol. The River Severn rose a full eight feet and spread mile from its bank, destroying farms and killing livestock on the way.
As is to be expected under such conditions, the seas became incredibly rough. Eddystone Lighthouse in Plymouth was completely destroyed and swept away. A boat in Kent was picked up by the wind and waves and washed 800 feet inland, while a ship on the Helford River in Cornwall was torn from its moorings and eventually washed up eight hours later in the Isle of Wight. Meanwhile, the HMS Association was blown all the way from Harwich in Suffolk to Gothenburg in Sweden. For the Royal Navy, the storm could not have come at a worse moment. They had been planning an assault on Cadiz, but strong winds in the days leading up to the storm had prevented ships from crossing the Channel. Instead, they were gathered, along with a collection of mercantile ships, at the mouth of the River Thames. Almost none of the ships sheltering here survived intact. Many were wrecked upon Goodwin Sands. As Goodwin Sands is largely uncovered at low tides, many sailors were able to climb onto the sands to await rescue. However, the ferocity of the storm meant that few rescue boats ever arrived. It’s estimated that nearly 1500 sailors were killed on Goodwin Sands alone, including the entire crews of both the HMS Northumberland and the HMS Restoration. In the Great Storm of 1703, the navy lost 13 ships and approximately one-fifth of their men.
This explains why so many of the testators in December 1703 had died aboard ship; they were all naval men who died upon Goodwin Sands. Looking at these wills more closely it becomes apparent that all thirteen were proved at the same time. Each bond is written in the same hand, with Lovell Lazenby acting as a witness to the majority of them, and each of the inventories of the deceased men’s goods has been written up by the same person. None of the men left very much. Edward Postgate and Christopher Abbott both left nothing more than one month’s back pay[2]. Both Christopher Abbott and Edward Moore’s inventories note that they did have more in “purse and apparail,” but that this too had been lost in the ship wreck. A few of the men were slightly better off. Both William Easingwold and Joseph Hunt were recorded as having owned “books and instruments,” while Robert Coats owned a chest and towels. Only three wives (Mary Thorpe, Isabell Wolfe and Ann Abbott) were named as executrixes. Both Edward Postgate and Henry Lund named their sisters as their executrixes. Six of the men left their goods in the care of their parents, while Samuel Bramman chose his “Loveing Friend Grace Baker, Widdow…or her son Lawrence if she be Dead.” As such, it seems safe to deduce that many men who joined the navy were fairly poor, unmarried, and young. They also seem to have been aware of the dangers they were facing. Samuel Bramman wrote that he made his will “considering the Dangers of the Seas and the Frailty and Uncertainty of this Transitory Life.”
Perhaps the most interesting of all of these wills is that of Lancelot Thorpe. His will, clearly written by a professional scribe, leaves just over £12 worth of goods to his wife. Yet, on the back of his will are two notes written in his own hand. The first epistle is to his wife, Mary. He starts by explaining that he “did aske <th>e ofesers [officer’s] advice” when writing his will, to make sure that everything would be made as easy as possible for Mary. He had noticed that a “great maney of our men dieth be for thay ken get thar willes wret,” and wanted to ensure that he was not in the same position. He wishes her “all <th>e Joy (and) Comefor that I have” and requests that she “doe not falle to write.” He then writes a longer note to his daughter. I’ve not been able to find her birth record, but as Mary and Lancelot had married in 1696, it’s unlikely that she was any older than six. He writes that he is “Rejoyesed boath in hart (and) seowle [soul] to heaeyer that you are seoe tendr and Dutifull to your der mother.” He reminds her of the love both he and Mary have for her, before entreating her to remain dutiful to her parents, keep good company and to look after the good of her soul. He writes: “if it plese god that you leive to be a mother of Cheildren you may find some of my words treu.” Personal messages are rare within probate files, so this hand-written note is a fortunate and very sweet survival.
The Great Storm of 1703 had a monumental impact upon the public consciousness. As with many great disasters of the day, it was believed the storm was a divine punishment, sent from God to punish England for their poor performance in the War of Spanish Succession against the Catholic Bourbons. January 19th 1704 was declared to be a national day of fasting to ask for forgiveness and mercy, and the Great Storm continued to be a common topic of sermons and homilies well into the nineteenth century. The physical effects of the storm were also felt for years after the event. The flooding round Bristol caused the land to become saturated with salt water. As a result, for years afterward the grass grown in this area had a salty taste to it, which in turn caused the animals that grazed upon it to be in poor health. One man in Somerset wrote to a local newspaper that the worst impact of the storm had been the loss of the local orchards. Thanks to their disappearance, there would be no cider the following year – a true tragedy! However, the reason this storm remained within public consciousness can also be partly put down to the fact that it coincided with the advent of English journalism. As such it was the first weather story to be reported as national news (a tradition we have continued ever since). Special broadsheet were produced and circulated across the country given details of the storm and the damage it had caused. Similarly, in the days following the storm, Defoe put an advert out in many pamphlets and broadsheets requesting that people write to him with their own impressions and tales of the storm. These were put together into a book simply titled The Storm first published in July 1704. Surviving copies of this book is where the vast majority of current knowledge about the storm has stemmed from, and it remains a fascinating read.
As an interesting side note, the damage sustained by the navy during the Great Storm of 1703meant that they never did attack Cadiz. Instead they changed the focus of their attack to the much smaller and less well-defended Gibraltar. The attack was successful, and Gibraltar was ceded to the British. So if you’ve ever wondered why Gibraltar is a British Overseas Territory, it turns out the weather is to blame.
A guest post by Dr George Redmonds, author of the Yorkshire Historic Dictionary.
If I were accused of eavesdropping I might be mildly embarrassed but I would certainly not expect to be punished for it. The truth is that we use the word loosely these days, not stopping to consider that the eavesdropper was once the scourge of the local community – a person who lurked at night under the eaves of a neighbour’s house in the hope of gathering titbits of gossip that could then be turned to advantage. The serious nature of the misdemeanour is clear from definitions in Law dictionaries, one of which describes the eavesdropper as a person who ‘hearkens after discourse … to frame slanders and mischievous tales’.
Entry on Eaves-droppers from Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England, 1768.
There is no record of just when eavesdropping started to be considered as an offence but in 1377, in Methley near Wakefield, Matilda Seamster was indicted at the manor court for listening under the walls of her neighbours’ houses at night and ‘narrating idle speeches’. That entry was in Latin, so the word ‘eavesdropper’ was not used but in Nottingham, in 1487, a jury found that Henry Rowley was a man who wandered around the village during the hours of darkness, and they indicted him as a common evys-dropper.
In Yorkshire it was more usual for the offender to be called an ‘eavesing dropper’ or an ‘easing dropper’ and a few early examples are found in the court rolls. In 1577, for example, Elizabeth Banke of Acomb, a village near York, was ordered to kepe hir house in the neight season and not be an esinge dropper; in Rastrick, in 1664, Elizabeth Dyson was presented for standeing under the ewse of the house of Joseph Goodheire as an ewseing dropper and was fined 10 shillings
It is not difficult to see how the word had acquired its meaning. In Old English the noun ‘eavesdrop’ (yfesdrype) referred originally to the water that dripped, or dropped, from the eaves of a house, but from that it came to mean the edge of the roof itself. In 1338, the sale of a house in York, in the narrow lane called St Peter the Little, required the parties concerned to agree about the space they would need should repairs or rebuilding be necessary. Two English words that were included for greater clarity were gettes and efsdropes, that is to say the ‘jetties’ or overhanging upper storeys and the ‘eavesdrops’ or projecting parts of the roofs.
The Shambles, York showing jetties and eavesdrops
Clearly, both of these affected the space available between the buildings at ground level and that could be a problem in narrow town streets – like the Shambles in York. As a consequence it became customary to restrict a person from building right up to the edge of his land, lest the water dripping from his eaves should cause a problem. That custom appears to be implicit in a Kent charter dated 868 where the word ‘yfæs drypæ’ is on record for the first time. It was in the space between the house wall and the ‘eavesdrip’ that our more inquisitive ancestors found shelter and were privy to a neighbour’s secrets.
Etymologically, the Old English word ‘efes’ was actually singular but the final –s has been mistaken for a plural and that is how we interpret ‘eaves’ now. When John Tyndall wrote in 1872 that ‘water trickles to the eave and then drops down’ he was employing what is called a ‘back formation’ – as we do when we use the word ‘pea’ and not ‘pease’.
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Edit 25/01/2019 The Yorkshire Historical Dictionary is now available online at yorkshiredictionary.york.ac.uk
In 1902, seventeen year-old Winifred Rowntree noted that there was nothing for teenage girls in York to do in the evenings . Inspired by the local evening school for adults, she decided to establish a club that would aim to entertain and educate girls from the area around Leeman Road. Not long after, Winifred and twenty-three other young women, most of whom had fathers who worked on the railway, agreed to meet every Monday evening, and thus the Honesty Girls Club was born.
Honesty Girls Club Membership Certificate
By 1913, the club was flourishing, with 116 members. After years of meeting in the evening school’s building, had finally moved into the club’s own purpose-built facilities. The senior class (for those who had left school) continued to meet on a Monday night to practice needlework and dancing. In the summers, they meet in Clifton Gardens, where the dancing would be replaced by gentle strolls around the gardens observing the flora and fauna. The club’s junior class (those aged eleven to fourteen) met on a Monday night. They would practice their plain sewing, before having an hour of games and dancing. Both sets of meetings ended with hymns and a prayer. Entrance cost a penny a week, although siblings got a discounted rate of a half-penny. For younger girls who hoped to join the club (those aged nine to eleven), “Drill Sessions” were run for an hour before Monday’s meetings which allowed them to show their commitment to the group. On summer Saturday afternoons, girls were invited on countryside rambles, but only if they had attended at least three club nights in the last month. This was one of twenty-five rules that members had to comply with, including: “Members shall remove their hats as soon as they enter the Club,” and “No sweets or other eatable to be brought into the Club at any time.”
The main aim of the Honesty Girls Club was to educate its members. The club had its own library, and senior members were automatically signed up to the Rowntree library. As the club expanded, they began to run evening classes for members. These covered a wide range of topic, including: singing, copper work, blouse-making, Morris dancing and folk songs, English literature, swimming, gardening, and “Dramatic Classes” that provided “Dramatic Entertainment” for the community. The club also held annual competitions, such as a wildflower competition in which prizes were offered to the girls who could collect the widest variety of species. In 1912, this was won by Rose Richardson, who successfully collected 169 specimens of wildflower. Spare a thought for poor Lily Bracewell, who came third in this contest for three years in a row, before having to drop out in the fourth year due to illness. In 1913, they set up the Snowdrop Band, a subsection of the club which invited “knowledgeable ladies” to come and share their expertise on topics, including: “Ideals of Womanhood,” “Physcial and Moral Health,” and “Thought Books,” a journal for pleasant thoughts that entered one’s head.
As its name suggests, the Honesty Girls Club organizers wished to instill kindness and honesty within its members. Their motto, an extract from My Love by James Russell Lowell, reads:
“She doeth little kindnesses Which most leave undone, or despise: Four naught that sets one heart at ease, And giveth ha ppiness of peace, Is low-esteemed in her eyes.”
To this end, they regularly ran events for the local community, including an annual Christmas party for children from the local workhouse and a weekly ‘Play Club’ for local children. In the 1912 annual report, it was noted: “There can be no doubt that the children unconsciously grow in the habit of self-control through the house spent in organised play.” Shortly after this, the junior class established a ‘Guild of Help’ which made baby clothes from recycled materials and gave them away to ‘very needy homes.’ They also created cradles out of banana crates which could be lent out to mothers as necessary. During the First World War, it was decided that such charitable acts was the best way for the club to support the war effort, and the Guild of Help became a vital part of the club.
It is thanks to Lily Scott that I was recently made aware of this little-remembered organisation. Lily Scott joined the Honesty Girls Club on February 20th 1903, when she would have been twelve years old. Starting in the junior group, she later progressed into the senior class, and was elected to the running committee in 1912. She probably left the club when she married in 1913, but continued to show an interest in its activities. A collection of items belonging to Lily but pertaining to the Honesty Girls Club were recently gifted to the Borthwick. As well as a substantial collection of the club’s annual reports, we also have a hand-embroidered cushion and a collection of copper items that Lily made while attending classes at the club. According to the annual reports, copperwork was one of the less popular classes, with only eleven girls attending in 1912, meaning Lily would have been in a minority. In one report, the teacher writes that the class have made excellent works, in spite of their small size, but that she does wish they would learn to clean up after themselves! Also in the collection is Lily’s certificate of membership. Girls had to prove their commitment, so were only given a certificate after they had regularly attended club meetings for three years. After five years of attendance, the club would have their certificate framed. While the frame no longer survives, the certificate has been mounted, and has survived in remarkably good condition.
Winifred Rowntree continued to oversee the Honesty Girls Club until her death in 1915, when her husband. Her funeral was attended by 110 club members, and they held their own memorial service for her. After her death, Winifred’s husband, A. D. Naish took over as President, while Winifred’s mother Emma Rowntree became Vice-President. They were assisted by a secretary and vice-secretary, both of whom were former members. However, the club was largely run by a committee of twelve girls annually elected from the senior group. These girls were responsible for running evening meetings, deciding which classes would run and finding teachers for them, and organizing any outreach programs. In later years, this committee was supported by former members of the club. The last annual report for the club was released in 1940. By this point numbers had dwindled; only four classes were still running. The Club probably closed shortly after.
