The Project Gutenberg eBook, History of the Fylde of Lancashire, by John Porter

HISTORY OF THE FYLDE
OF LANCASHIRE,

BY
JOHN PORTER, M.R.C.S., L.S.A.

FLEETWOOD AND BLACKPOOL:
W. PORTER AND SONS, PUBLISHERS.
1876.

[All rights reserved.]

FLEETWOOD AND BLACKPOOL:
PRINTED BY W. PORTER AND SONS.

TO
BENJAMIN WHITWORTH, ESQUIRE, M.P.,
In admiration of his Enterprise, Generosity, and Philanthropy,
displayed in the Fylde, and elsewhere,
and as
a tribute of personal regard and esteem,
THIS VOLUME
IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED, BY
THE AUTHOR.

PREFACE.

A few, and only a few, words are needed to introduce the History of the Fylde to the public. In its preparation my aim has been to make the work as comprehensive in description and detail as the prescribed limits would allow, and I have endeavoured to write in a style free from any tendency to pedantry, and I hope, also, from dulness. How far these conditions have been fulfilled I must now leave to the judgment of the reader, doing so with some degree of confidence that at any rate the attempt will be generally appreciated, if the success be not universally acknowledged. In the course of my labours I have availed myself of the works of various authors, and desire to acknowledge my indebtedness, especially to Baines’s Lancashire, Fishwick’s Kirkham, Thornber’s Blackpool, and many volumes of the Cheetham and other historical societies. My thanks for valuable aid are also due to the following gentlemen, amongst others, the Ven. Archdeacon Hornby, of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre; the Rev. W. Richardson, of Poulton-le-Fylde; Col. Bourne, M.P., of Hackensall and Heathfield; John Furness, esq., of Fulwood; W. H. Poole, esq., of Fleetwood; and the Bailiffs of Kirkham.

JOHN PORTER.

Fleetwood, August, 1876.

ERRATA.

[Page 7], line 15, after the word crossing, insert the Main Dyke from. This Dyke is crossed after leaving, and not before reaching, Staining, as stated.

[Page 147], line 9 from the bottom, for Gulph, read Gulf.

[Page 183], line 2, for 1857, read 1657.

[Page 256], dele the heading Coasting.

[Page 286], line 2 from the bottom, for fortified, read forfeited.

[Page 289], line 13 from the bottom, for the first funds, read expenses.

CONTENTS.

HISTORY OF THE FYLDE.

CHAPTER I.
THE ANCIENT BRITONS, ROMANS, ANGLO-SAXONS, AND DANES.

“See! in what crowds the uncouth forms advance:

Each would outstrip the other, each prevent

Our careful search, and offer to your gaze,

Unask’d, his motley features. Wait awhile,

My curious friends! and let us first arrange

In proper order your promiscuous throng.”

The large district of western Lancashire, denominated from time immemorial the Fylde, embraces one third at least of the Hundred of Amounderness, and a line drawn from Ashton, on the Ribble, to Churchtown, on the Wyre, forms the nearest approach to an eastern boundary attainable, for although the section cut off by its means includes more land and villages than properly appertain to the Fylde, a more westerly division would exclude others which form part of it. The whole of the parishes of Bispham, Lytham, Poulton, and St. Michael’s; and the parish of Kirkham, exclusive of Goosnargh-with-Newsham and Whittingham, are comprised in the Fylde country.

The word Amounderness was formerly considered to signify the “Promontory of Agmund,” or “Edmund,” and this origin is alluded to in a treatise written some years since by Mr. Thomas Baines on the “Valley of the Mersey,” in which the following remarks occur:—“In the year 911 the Northumbrians themselves began the war, for they despised the peace which King Edward and his ‘Witan’ offered them, and overran the land of Mercia. After collecting great booty they were overtaken on their march home by the forces of the West Saxons and the Mercians, who put them to flight and slew many thousands of them. Two Danish Kings and five Earls were slain in this battle. Amongst the Earls slain was Agmund, the governor, from whom the Hundred of Agmunderness (Amounderness) was probably named.” In order that the reader may properly comprehend why Mr. Baines should surmise that Amounderness received its title from the Danish Earl, Agmund, it may be stated that the extensive province of Northumbria, then colonised by the Northmen or Danes, embraced, amongst other territory, the district afterwards called Lancashire, and, consequently, the Hundred of Amounderness would be in a great measure under Danish governance. When, however, we call to mind that the Danes did not invade England until A.D. 787, and learn that this Hundred was entered in the Ripon grant in A.D. 705, as Hacmunderness, it becomes obvious that the name cannot have been conferred upon it by that nation, and some other source must be looked to for its origin. In Gibsons’ Etymological Geography there is “Anderness” (for Ackmunderness) described as a “promontory sheltered by oaks, (ac, oak; and mund, protection).” As many large trunks of trees have been discovered beneath the layers of peat in the extensive local mosses, whilst others have been laid bare along the shore by the action of the tides, it can be readily believed that at one time the greater share of the district was clothed with forests. Leyland, who was antiquary to Henry VIII., and surveyed the Hundred during the reign of that monarch, 1509-47, says:—“Al Aundernesse for the most parte in time paste hathe been full of woods, and many of the moores replenished with hy fyrre trees; but now such part of Aundernesse as is towarde the se is sore destitute of woodde.” With such irrefutable evidences of the early woodland condition of Amounderness, there need be no hesitation in accepting the signification which Messrs. Gibson have given to the name—the Ness or Promontory protected by oaks. The word Fylde is regarded simply as a corruption of “Field.” Camden in his “Britannia” of 1590, writes:—

“Tota est campestris, unde Fild pro Field appellatur.”[1]

(The whole is champaign, whence it is called Fild for Field.)

In a subsequent edition of the same work Fild is spelt File, and the latter orthography was used in Fileplumpton, in the Duchy records, afterwards called Fylde Plumpton, and now Wood Plumpton. The Fylde section of this Hundred is a level well-watered country, highly cultivated and richly productive, especially of grain, from which circumstance it was formerly designated the corn-field of Amounderness.

Anterior to the third invasion of the Romans in A.D. 43, the inhabitants of the Fylde and other portions of Lancashire lying between the range of mountains which separates this county from Yorkshire, and the coast about the Bay of Morecambe, were called the Setantii or Segantii, “the dwellers in the country of water,” but at that date the whole tract populated by these people was included in the more extensive province of the Brigantes, comprehending what are now known as the six counties of York, Durham, Northumberland, Westmoreland, Cumberland, and Lancaster. The Fylde at that epoch would be composed chiefly of morasses and forests, interspersed with limited areas and narrow paths of more stable land, and there can be little doubt that the dwellers on such an uninviting spot must have been very few, but that it was traversed and, as far as practicable, inhabited by the ancient Setantii is evident from the several relics of them which have been discovered amongst the peat in modern days. Two or three canoes, consisting of light wooden frameworks, covered with hides, were found by a man named Jolly, about half a century ago, when cutting the “Main Dyke” of Marton Mere;[2] Celtic hammers, axes, and spears have also been taken out of the mosses in the district, all of which were doubtless originally the property of the aboriginal Britons. The bay of Morecambe and the river Wyre acquired their distinctive appellations from the Setantii, the one being derived from the Celtic gwyr, pure or fresh, and the other from mawr, great, and cam, winding or bent.

The hardihood of the native Britons of these parts is attested by Dion Cassius, who informs us that they lived on prey, hunting, and the fruits of trees, and were accustomed to brave hunger, cold, and all kinds of toil, for they would “continue several days up to their chins in water, and bear hunger many days.” In the woods their habitations were wicker shelters, formed of the branches of trees interwoven together, and, in the open grounds, clay or mud huts. They were indebted to the skins of animals slain in the chase for such scanty covering as they cared to wear, and according to Cæsar and other writers, dyed their bodies with woad, which produced a blue colour, and had long flowing hair, being cleanly shaved except the head and upper lip. That the power of endurance possessed by the Setantii, and the neighbouring Brigantes is not to be understood literally as expressed by Cassius may, we venture to think, be taken for granted. It can scarcely be credited that the human frame could ever be reduced or exalted to such an amphibious condition as to be indifferent whether it passed a number of days on dry land or under water; it seems more probable that in his description Cassius referred to the hunting and other expeditions of the inhabitants into the forests and morasses of the Fylde and similarly wooded and marshy tracts, where there is no question the followers of the chase would be more or less in a state of immersion during the whole time they were so engaged.

The religion of the Setantii was Druidical, and their deities resembled those of other heathen nations, such as the Romans and Greeks of that era, but differed in their names. Cæsar tells us that this order of priesthood was presided over by a superior, who was known as the chief Druid, and had almost unlimited authority over all the rest. The Druids were settled at various points of the island, where they erected their temples, but in addition to these principle stations, many of their order were scattered amongst the native tribes of Britain, over which they appear to have exercised the functions and power of judges, arranging both public and private disputes, and deciding all criminal cases. It was part of the creed professed by the Setantii, to vow, when they were engaged in warfare, that they would, through the agency of the Druids, immolate human victims as an atonement for slaughtered enemies, believing that unless man’s life were given for man’s life, the divine anger of the immortal Gods could not be appeased. There were other sacrifices of the same kind instituted at regularly appointed seasons and on special occasions. The Setantii also believed in an immortal soul, but seem to have had no idea of a higher state, as their priests inculcated the doctrine that after death the soul was transported to another body, “imagining that by this the men were more effectually roused to valour, the fear of death being taken away.”[3] Ornaments called “Druids’ eggs,” and worn only by these priests, have been found in the Fylde.

How Cæsar, in B.C. 54 and 55, invaded Britain a first and a second time, achieving at best an empty conquest, and how, after his death, the emperor Claudius sent over an army with a determination to exterminate the Druids, and after thirty pitched battles, subdued province after province, is beyond the limits of this work to state, but as a connecting link of the history of the country with that of our own county, and that portion of it especially under examination, it may be stated that Britain was finally conquered by the Romans under Julius Agricola, and that the best investigation of the subject leads to the opinion that the district which we call Lancashire, was brought into subjection to the Roman conqueror in A.D. 79. A vigorous resistance was for long offered to the army of invaders in the territory of the Setantii by the natives under the Brigantine chief Venutius, but the well drilled legions of the Romans, when commanded by Agricola, proved too formidable to be checked or broken by the wild, undisciplined valour of the Setantii. Tacitus, the son-in-law of the general, informs us that early in the summer of A.D. 79, Agricola personally inspected his soldiers, and marked out many of the stations, one of which, either made at that time or later by the same people, was situated at Kirkham, on the line of the Roman road running from the mouth of Wyre, which will be described hereafter. He explored the estuaries and woods along the western coast of Lancashire, and harassed the enemy by sudden and frequent incursions. When the Brigantes and Setantii had been thoroughly overawed and disheartened by the invincible Romans, Agricola stayed his operations in order to shew them the blessings of peace, and in that way many towns which had bravely held out were induced to surrender and give hostages. These places he surrounded with guards and fortifications. The following winter was passed in endeavouring, by various incentives to pleasure, to subdue the warlike nature of the Britons, thereby diminishing the danger of an outbreak, especially amongst such tribes as the Setantii, whose intrepid spirits had been so difficult to quell, and who were not likely to submit quietly to the yoke of the conqueror, unless some means were adopted to allure them by the charms of civilised luxury from their free field and forest mode of existence. Temples, courts of justice, and comfortable habitations were first erected; the sons of the petty chiefs were next instructed in the liberal arts, and Agricola professed to prefer the genius of the Britons to the attainments of the Gauls. The Roman dress became the fashion, and the toga was frequently worn. The “porch, luxurious baths, and elegant banquets” were regularly instituted, and by degrees the crafty design of the Roman general was accomplished, and the vanquished Britons had ceased to be the hardy warriors of old.

About one century after the subjugation of Britain by Agricola no less than seven important Roman stations, or garrisoned places, had risen up in the county of Lancaster, and were situated at Manchester, Colne, Warrington, Lancaster, Walton-le-dale, Ribchester, and Overborough. The minor ones, such as Kirkham, supposing their sites to have been first built upon in a season of warfare, subsequently became small settlements only, and were, in all probability, unused as military depots. The rivers which flowed in the neighbourhood of the several encampments, terminated in three estuaries, denominated by Ptolemy,[4] the ancient geographer, in his book, completed in A.D. 130, the Seteia Æstuarium, the Moricambe Æstuarium, and the Belisama Æstuarium. The first of these estuaries is generally regarded as the mouth of the Dee, the second is identified with Morecambe Bay, and the third with the Ribble by some historians and the Mersey by others. The same authority mentions also a Portus Setantiorum, which has been located on the banks of the Ribble, Lune, and Mersey, by different antiquarians, but in the opinion of the most recent writers the ancient harbour of the Setantii was situated at the mouth of the river Wyre. Further reference to the Setantian port will be made in a later page of the present chapter.

At the shore margin of the warren at Fleetwood there was visible, about forty years ago, the abrupt and broken termination of a Roman road, which could be traced across the sward, along the Naze below Burn Hall, and onward in the direction of Poulton. From that town it ran in a southerly line towards Staining, crossing Marton Mere, on its way, in the cutting of which its materials were very apparent, and lying on the low mossy lands to the depth of two yards in gravel. From Staining it proceeded to Weeton, and in a hollow near to the moss of that township, consisted of an immense stony embankment several yards in height; in the moss itself the deep beds of gravel were distinctly observable, and from there the road continued its course up the rising ground to Plumpton, the traces as usual being less obvious on the higher land. From Plumpton it travelled towards the elevated site of a windmill between Weeton moss and Kirkham, at which point it turned suddenly, and joined the public road, running in a continuous straight line towards the latter town. The greater part of the long street of Kirkham is either upon or in the immediate vicinity of the old Roman road. From Kirkham the road directed its course towards Lund church, somewhere in the neighbourhood of which it was joined by another path formed by the same people and commencing at the Neb of the Naze near Freckleton.[5] Leaving Lund it ran through Lea on to Fulwood moor, where it took the name of Watling street, and proceeded on to Ribchester. This road has always been known in the Fylde as the Danes’ Pad, from a tradition that those pirates made use of it at a later period in their incursions into our district, visiting and ransacking Kirkham, Poulton, and other towns or hamlets of the unfortunate Saxons. Numerous relics, chiefly of the Roman soldiery, have been dug or ploughed up at different times out of the soil, bordering on the road, or found amongst the pebbles of which it was composed, and amongst them may be mentioned spears, both British and Roman, horse shoes in abundance, several stone hammers, a battle axe, a broken sword, and ancient Roman coins, all of which were picked up along its line between Wyre mouth and Weeton. Several half-baked urns marked with dots, and pieces of rudely fashioned pottery were discovered in an extensive barrow or cairn near Weeton-lane Heads, which was accidentally opened, and is now pointed out as the abode of the local hairy ghost or boggart. In the neighbourhood of Kirkham there have been found many broken specimens of Roman pottery, stones prepared for building purposes, eight or ten urns, some containing ashes and beads, stone handmills for corn grinding, ancient coins, “Druids’ eggs,” axes, and horse shoes; in the fields near Dowbridge, where several of the above urns were discovered, there was found a flattened ivory needle, about five or six inches long with a large eyelet. A cuirass was also picked up on the banks of the Wyre; but the most interesting relic of antiquity is the boss or umbo of a shield, taken out of a ditch near Kirkham, which will be fully described in the chapter devoted to that township. The Romans were accustomed to make three kinds of roads, the first of which, called the Viæ Militares, were constructed during active warfare, when they were engaged in pushing their way into the territory of the enemy, and easy unobstructed communication between their various encampments became a matter of the utmost importance. The second, or public roads, were formed to facilitate commerce in time of peace; and the third were narrower paths, called private roads. The county of Lancaster was intersected by no less than four important Roman routes, two of which ran from north to south, and two traversed the land from west to east. The course of one road, and perhaps the best constructed of the whole four, we have just followed out; of the remainder, the first, commencing at Carlisle, passed near Garstang and Preston, crossed the Irwell at Old Trafford, and maintaining its southerly direction, ultimately arrived at Kinderton, in Cheshire. The second extended from Overborough to Slack, in Yorkshire, passing on its way through Ribchester, the Ribble, Radcliffe, Prestwich, and Newton Heath; whilst the third had its origin at a ford on the Mersey, in close proximity to Warrington, and from that spot could be traced through Barton, Eccles, Manchester, Moston, Chadderton, Royton, and Littleborough, thence over Rumbles Moor to Ilkley, where was located the temple of the goddess Verbeia. It is conjectured that these roads, which consisted for the most part of pavement and deep beds of gravel, were begun, or at least marked out, by Agricola during the time he was occupied in the subjugation of Lancashire, and if this very probable hypothesis be correct the course taken by that general in his exploration of the woods of the Fylde, and the estuaries of Morecambe and the Ribble is clearly indicated by the direction of the ancient path communicating with the mouth of Wyre and the Naze.

At the opening of the third century the Roman governor of Britain found it necessary to obtain the personal co-operation of Severus, in order to put an effectual check to the repeated outbreaks of the natives; in A.D. 207, that emperor having landed and established his head-quarters at York, a considerable force marched northwards under his leadership to punish the revolting tribes, and it is surmised that the curious road, running across the mosses of Rawcliffe, Stalmine, and Pilling, was constructed by the legionaries whilst on this tour. The pathway alluded to, and commonly known as Kate’s Pad, was deeply situated in the mosses, and had apparently been formed by fastening riven oak planks on to sleepers of the same material, secured and held stationary by means of pins or rivets driven into the marl a little above which they rested. Its width was about twenty inches, but in some places rather more.[6] Herodian, in describing the expedition of Severus to quell the insurrection of the Briton, says:—“He more especially endeavoured to render the marshy places stable by means of causeways, that his soldiers, treading with safety, might pass them, and having firm footing fight to advantage. In these the natives are accustomed to swim and traverse about, being immersed as high as their waists: for going naked as to the greater part of their bodies they contemn the mud. His army having passed beyond the rivers and fortresses which defended the Roman territory, there were frequent attacks and skirmishes, and retreats on the side of the barbarians. To these indeed flight was an easy matter, and they lay hidden in the thickets and marshes through their local knowledge; all which things being adverse to the Romans served to protract the war.” There can be no doubt that, when the path, which consisted in some parts of one huge tree and in others of two or more, was formed, timber must have been very plentiful in the vicinity, and at the present day numbers of tree trunks of large size are to be found in the mosses, further corroborating the conclusions arrived at by Leyland, whose words have already been quoted, and Holinshed, who wrote:—“The whole countrie of Lancaster has beene forests heretofore.” An iron fibula, a pewter wine-strainer, a wooden drinking bowl, hooped with two brass bands and having two handles, a brass stirrup, and other relics have been taken out of the moss fields; and in the same neighbourhood an anvil, several pieces of thin sheet-brass, and a pair of shears were discovered in a ditch.

About the year 416 the Romans finally removed themselves from our island, taking with them many of the brave youths of Britain, and leaving the country in the hands of a people whose inactive habits, acquired under their dominion, had rendered them ignorant of the art and unfit for the hardships of warfare. According to Ethelwerd’s Chronicle, in the year 418 those few of the Roman race who were left in Britain, not being able to put up with the manifold insults of the natives, buried their treasure in pits, hoping that at some future day, when all animosity had subsided, they would be able to recover it and live peaceably, but such a fortunate consummation never arrived, and weary at length of waiting, they assembled on the coasts and “spreading their canvass to the wind, sought an exile on the shores of Gaul.” The Saxon Chronicle says:—“This year, A.D. 418, the Romans collected all the treasures that were in Britain, and some they hid in the earth so that no one since has been able to find them; and some they carried with them into Gaul.” It is far from unlikely that the silver denarii, discovered in 1840 by some brickmakers near Rossall, and amounting to four hundred coins of Trajan, Hadrian, Titus, Vespasian, Domitian, Antonius, Severus, Sabina, etc., were deposited in that spot for security by one of those much harassed Romans, previous to his departure from our coast.

A prize so easily to be obtained as Britain in its practically unprotected state appeared, was not long in attracting the covetousness of the neighbouring Picts and Scots, who came down in thousands from the north, forced their way beyond the Roman Wall erected by Hadrian, occupied the fortresses and towns, and spread ruin and devastation in their track. The northern counties were the chief sufferers from these ruthless marauders. Cumberland, Yorkshire, and Lancashire, were ravaged and plundered to such an extent that had it not been for the seasonable assistance of the Saxons, the whole country they embrace would have been utterly devastated and almost depopulated. Gildas, the earliest British historian[7], born about 500, described our land before the incursions of the Picts and Scots as abounding in pleasant hills, spreading pastures, cultivated fields, silvery streams, and snow-white sands, and spoke of the roofs of the buildings in the twenty-eight cities of the kingdom as “raised aloft with threatening hugeness.” We may readily conceive how this picture of peace and prosperity was marred and ruined, as far as the three counties above-named were concerned, by the destroying hand of the northern nation. The British towns were still surrounded by the fortified walls and embattled towers, built by the Romans, but the unfortunate inhabitants, so long unaccustomed to

“The close-wedged battle and the din of war,”

and deprived of their armed soldiers and valiant youth, were panic stricken by the fierce onslaughts of the Scottish tribes, and fled before their advancing arms. Some idea of the critical and truly pitiable condition to which they were reduced may be gleaned from the tenor of an appeal for help sent by them to their old rulers, which the author last quoted has preserved as follows:—

The Lamentation of the Britons unto Agitius, thrice Consul.

“The barbarians drive us to the sea, the sea drives us back to the barbarians. Thus of two kinds of death, one or other must be our choice, either to be swallowed up by the waves or butchered by the sword.”

The Romans were fully occupied with enemies of their own, the Goths, and consequently were unprepared to offer any assistance to the Britons, whose position was shortly afterwards rendered additionally wretched by famine and its attendant evils. At that period both the state of Lancashire itself and of its inhabitants must have been exceedingly deplorable—the country ravaged and still exposed to the depredations and barbarities of the enemy, had now become a prey to a fearful dearth. Many of the descendants of the old Setantii, unable any further to support the double contest, yielded themselves up to the Picts and Scots in the hope of obtaining food to appease the fierce cravings of hunger, whilst others, more hardy, but outnumbered and weakened by long fasts, sought refuge in the woods and such other shelters as the neighbourhood afforded. Disappointed in the Romans, the Britons applied for aid to the Saxons, or Anglo-Saxons, a mixed and piratical tribe, dwelling on the banks of the German Ocean, and composed of Jutes, Angles, and pure Saxons. The men of this race are described as determined, fearless, and of great size, with blue eyes, ruddy complexions, and yellow streaming hair. They were well practised in warfare, and armed with battle-axes, swords, spears, and maces. Their chief god was Odin, or Woden, and their heaven Valhalla. About one thousand of these warriors, under the command of Hengist and Horsa, embarked in three vessels, built of hides, and called Cyulæ or Ceols. They landed on the coast of Kent, about the year 449, and by the direction of Vortigern, king of the Island, marched northwards until they arrived near York, where an encounter of great moment took place, terminating in the utter defeat of the Picts and Scots. Inspirited by so early and signal a success the Saxons followed up their advantage with alacrity, drove the baleful marauders out of the counties of Lancaster and York, and finally compelled them to retreat across the frontier into their own territory. After having rescued the kingdom from these invaders the Saxons settled at York and Manchester, and not only evinced no sign of returning to their own country, but even despatched messengers for fresh troops. This strange and suspicious conduct on the part of their allies excited considerable alarm and anxiety amongst the Britons, who practically expressed their disapproval by refusing to make any provision for the reinforcements. After a short interval a mandate was issued to the Saxon leader ordering him to withdraw his army from the soil of Britain. Incensed and stimulated by such decisive action Hengist determined at once to carry out the object he had cherished from the first—the subjugation of the people and the seizure of the island. Having procured a further supply of men under his son Octa, he established them in the country of the Brigantes, and almost immediately invited the native nobles to a friendly conference with his chiefs on Salisbury plain. The Britons, who were far from suspecting his treacherous design, attended the assembly unarmed, and in that defenceless state fell an easy prey to their Saxon hosts, who in the midst of feasting and revelry, brutally massacred the whole of their guests. Successful in his cowardly and murderous stratagem, Hengist took possession of the southern counties, whilst his son Octa maintained his sway over the Brigantine province of Northumbria, in which the Fylde was included, as intimated at the beginning of the chapter.

The ancient warlike spirit of the Setantii, which had lain almost dormant for centuries, was once more thoroughly aroused in the natives of Lancashire, and a determined and valiant opposition offered by them to Octa and his army. Overborough capitulated only when its inhabitants were worn out by fatigue and famine, whilst Warrington and Manchester sustained severe and protracted sieges before they fell into the hands of the enemy. Nennius, another early historian, who was born towards the end of the sixth century, informs us that the famous King Arthur and his sixty Knights of the Round Table worsted the Saxons in twelve successive battles, four of which were fought on the banks of the Douglas, near Wigan. In those conflicts our county was well and effectively represented in the person of Paulinus, the commander of the right wing of the army, who after many brave and sanguinary struggles overthrew the hitherto unconquered Octa, and for a time, at least, delivered the Fylde and other parts of Northumbria from the rule of the Saxons. This gallant soldier was the offspring of a union between a Roman warrior and a British maiden, who had established themselves in Manchester. The chieftain Ella, however, compelled the Britons to submission, and assumed the government over part of Northumbria. Clusters of Saxon huts, soon growing into villages, now sprang up on the soil of the Fylde, which under the wood-levelling and marsh-draining Romans had lost much of its swampy and forest characters and been transformed into a more habitable locality. We need have little hesitation in conjecturing that the valour displayed by the inhabitants of our county was greatly increased, and often rendered almost desperate, by the knowledge that if their land were subdued and occupied by the Saxons the key, if it may so be called, to their mountainous strongholds would be lost, and the line of communication between them impassably and irretrievably obstructed; for the venerable Bede[8] tells us that a portion of the Britons fled to the hills and fells of Furness, and we are aware that a much larger share sought refuge amongst the mountains of Wales, lying to the south-west, and visible from the shores of the Fylde. Others escaped over to Armorica in France, and from them it acquired the name of Brittany. Additional evidence that Furness was peopled by the Britons, even for more than two centuries after the arrival of the Saxons, is to be found in the writings of Camden, who says:—“The Britons in Furness lived securely for a long time, relying upon those fortifications, wherewith nature had guarded them; for that the Britons lived here in the 228th year after the coming of the Saxons, is plain from hence; that at that time Egfrid, the king of the Northumbrians, gave to St. Cuthbert the land called Cartmell, and all the Britons in it; for so it is related in his life.”

The Saxons were great idolaters, and soon crowded the country with their temples and images. The deities they worshipped have furnished us with names for the different days of the week, thus Sunday is derived from Sunan the sun, Monday from Monan the moon, Tuesday from Tuisco a German god, Wednesday from Woden, Thursday from Thor or Thur, Friday from Friga, and Saturday from Seater.

When the nation was once more at peace, all the towns and castles which had been damaged during the wars were repaired, and others, which had been destroyed, rebuilt. The Britons were brought by degrees to look with less disfavour on their conquerors, and as time progressed adopted their heathenish faith and offered up prayer at the shrines of the same idols, drifting back into darkness and forgetting or ignoring those true doctrines which, it is said, had been declared and expounded to them at the very commencement of the Christian era. According to Clemens Romanus and Theodoret, the Apostle Paul was one of the earliest preachers of the Gospel in Britain, but whatever amount of truth there may be in this statement, it is certain that at the Council of Arles in A.D. 314, and ten years later at that of Nicene, three British bishops were present. All traces of their former religion quickly vanished from amongst the native population of Lancashire under the pagan influence of their rulers; and it was during that unhallowed age that Gregory, surnamed the Great, and afterwards pontiff, being attracted by the handsome appearance of some youths exposed for sale in the market-place at Rome, and finding, on inquiry, that they came from the kingdom of Deira, in Britain, determined to send over Augustine and Paulinus to Christianise the inhabitants. In 596 Augustine landed with forty missionaries on the coast of Kent, the king became a convert, and the new faith spread rapidly throughout the island. Thousands were baptised by Paulinus in the river Swale, then called the Northumbrian Jordan, and the waters of Ribble were also resorted to for the performance of similar ceremonies.

The advent of the Roman mission initiated a fresh epoch in the ecclesiastical history of the county, monasteries and religious houses sprang up in different parts, and at the consecration of the church and monastery of Ripon, lands bordering on the Ribble, in Hacmundernesse (Amounderness), in Gedene, and in Duninge were presented amongst other gifts to that foundation. Paulinus was created bishop of Northumbria in 627, and it is to his ministrations and pious example that the conversion of the inhabitants of the Fylde and vicinal territory is generally attributed. The Saxon Chronicle records, however, that in 565 Columba “came from Scotia (Ireland) to preach to the Picts.” Columba was born at Garten, a village in county Donegal, and according to Selden and other learned writers, the religion professed by him and the Culdees, as the priests of his order were called, was strictly Presbyterian. Bede writes:—“They preached only such works of charity and piety as they could learn from prophetical, evangelical, and apostolic writings.” Columba established a monastery at Iona. Dr. Giles states that “the ancient name of Iona was I or Hi, or Aoi, which was Latinised into Hyona, or Iona; the common name of it now is I-colum-kill, the Island of Colum of the Cells.” Bishop Turner affirms that “the lands in Amounderness, on the Ribble,” were first presented to a Culdee abbot, named Eata, on the erection of a monastery at Ripon, but that before the building was finished he was dismissed and St. Wilfred made abbot of Ripon, sometime before 661. If the foregoing assertion be correct there is certain evidence that the Culdee doctrines were also promulgated in Lancashire, and doubtless in our own district, at that early date. Bede seems to support such an assumption when he states that the Ripon lands were originally granted to those who professed the creed of the Picts to build a monastery upon, and did not pass to St. Wilfred, bishop of Northumbria, until afterwards, in 705, when he re-edified the monastery. Whatever discrepancies may exist as to the exact period and manner in which Christianity was introduced or revived in the bosoms of our forefathers, there is ample and reliable proof that the majority of them had embraced the true faith about the middle of the seventh century, when churches were probably erected in the hamlets of Kirkham and St. Michael’s-on-Wyre.

About the year 936 the Hundred of Amounderness was granted by Athelstan to the See of York:—“I, Athelstan, king of the Angles, etc., freely give to the Omnipotent God, and to the blessed Apostle Peter, at his church in the diocese of York, a certain section of land, not small in extent, in the place which the inhabitants call Amounderness,” etc. The Hundred of Amounderness when this grant was made must have been pretty thickly peopled, for Athelstan states that he “purchased it at no small price,” and land at that date was valued chiefly by the number of its residents. Here it will be convenient to observe that in some instances, as in that of Amounderness, the Hundreds acquired the additional titles of Wapentakes, and, in explanation of the origin of the term, we learn from “Thoresby Ducat Leodiens,” that when a person received the government of a Wapentake, he was met, at the appointed time and usual place, by the elder portion of the inhabitants, and, after dismounting from his horse, he held up his spear and took a pledge of fealty from all according to the usual custom. Whoever came touched his spear with theirs, and by such contact of arms they were confirmed in one common interest. So from wœpnu, a weapon, and tac, a touch, or taccare, to confirm, the Hundreds were called Wapentakes. Traces of the above antique ceremony are still to be met with in the peculiar form of expression used when the tenantry and others are summoned by the manorial lords of Amounderness to attend their court-barons and court-leets.

The Heptarchy, established about 550, and consisting of seven sovereign states, was finally abolished in 830, and Egbert became king over the whole island. The province of Northumbria, more especially the Fylde and tracts of adjoining territory, had at that date been the scene of irregular and intermittent warfare during the previous forty years. Lancashire had suffered cruelly from the visitations of the Northmen, or Danes, who spared neither age, sex, nor condition in their furious sallies. In the years 787, 794, and 800, these pirates invaded the soil, ravaged the country, butchered the inhabitants, and on the last occasion shot Edmund, the king of the West Saxons, to death with arrows, because he refused to renounce the Christian faith and embrace the errors of heathenism. Egbert was no sooner seated on the throne than the Danes re-appeared off the coasts, and there can be little doubt that some of their bands made their way down the western shore of the island, entered the Bay of Morecambe, and, guided by the old Roman road near the mouth of the Wyre, pushed onwards into and through the heart of the Fylde, plundering and laying waste villages, hamlets, and every trace of agriculture in their path. “The name of the Danes’ Pad,” says Mr. Thornber, “given to the Roman agger is and ever will be an everlasting memorial of their ravages and atrocities in this quarter.”[9] In addition it may be stated that many warlike relics of the Danes have been found along the road here indicated, and that the names of the Great and Little Knots in the channel of Wyre, opposite Fleetwood, were of pure Scandinavian derivation, and signified “round heaps,” probably, of stones. These mounds were, during the formation of the harbour entrance, either destroyed or disfigured beyond recognition. Several localities, also, along the sea boundary of the Fylde bear Danish denominations, which will be treated of hereafter. In 869 Lancashire was again visited by a dreadful famine, and many of the people in every part of the county fell victims either to the dearth itself or the fatal disorders following in its train. Those who were fortunate enough to escape the wholesale destruction of the scourge suffered so severely from the merciless massacres of the Danes that at the accession of Alfred the Great, in 871, our Hundred was but sparsely populated. During the reign of that illustrious monarch England was divided into counties, which again were subdivided into Hundreds. Each Hundred was composed of ten Tithings, and each Tithing of ten Freeholders and their families. When this division of the kingdom was effected the south-western portion of the old province of Northumbria was separated from the remainder, and received the name of Lonceshire, from the capital Loncaster, the castle on the Lone, or Lune. Alfred, as we are told by his biographer Asser, did much to improve the condition of his subjects both for peace and war; referring to their illiterate state, on his accession the king himself says:—“When I took the kingdom there were very few on the south side of the river Humber, the most improved portion of England, who could understand their daily prayers in English, or translate a letter from the Latin. I think they were not many beyond the Humber. There were so few that I cannot, indeed, recollect one single instance on the south of the Thames.”[10] After suffering a defeat at Wilton almost at the outset of his career, Alfred surprised and overthrew the Danish camp at Eddington; Guthrum, their leader, and the whole of his followers were taken prisoners, but afterwards liberated and permitted to colonise East Anglia, and subsequently Northumbria, an act of clemency which entailed most disastrous consequences upon the different sections of the latter province. The Fylde now became the legalised abode of numbers of the northern race, between whom and the Saxon settlers perpetual strife was carried on; in addition the restless and covetous spirit of the new colonists constantly prompted them to raids beyond the legitimate limits of their territory, rebellions amongst themselves, and conspiracies against the king; insurrection followed insurrection, and it was not until Athelstan had inflicted a decisive blow upon the Danish forces, and brought the seditious province of Northumbria under his own more immediate dominion, that a short lull of peace was obtained. In the reign of his successor, however, they broke out again, and having been once more reduced to order, agreed to take the name of Christians, abjure their false gods, and live quietly henceforth. These promises, made to appease the anger of Edmund, were only temporarily observed, and their turbulent natures were never tranquilised until Canute, the first Danish king, ascended the throne of England in 1017. The Norse line of monarchs comprised only three, and terminated in 1041. Reverting to Athelstan and the Danes we find that about ten years after the subjugation of the latter in 926, as recorded in the Saxon Chronicle, Anlaf, a noted Danish chieftain, made a vigorous attempt to regain Northumbria. The site of the glorious battle where this ambitious project was overthrown and the army of Anlaf routed and driven to seek refuge in flight from the shore, on which they had but a short time previously landed exulting in a prospect of conquest and plunder, is a matter of dispute, and nothing authentic can be discovered concerning it beyond the fact that the name of the town or district where the forces met was Brunandune or Brunanburgh, and was situated in the province of Northumbria. The former orthography is used in Ethelwerd’s Chronicle:—“A fierce battle was fought against the barbarians at Brunandune, whereof that fight is called great even to the present day; then the barbarian tribes were defeated and domineer no longer; they are driven beyond the ocean.” Burn, in Thornton township, is one of the several rival localities which claim to have witnessed the sanguinary conflict. In the Domesday Survey, Burn was written Brune, and it also comprises a rising ground or Dune, which seem to imply some connection with Brunandune. From an ancient song or poem, bearing the date 937, it is clear that the battle lasted from sunrise to sunset, and that at night-fall Anlaf and the remnant of his followers, being utterly discomfited, escaped from the coast in the manner before described. This circumstance also upholds the pretentions of Burn, as it is situated close to the banks of the Wyre, and at a very short distance both from the Irish Sea and Morecambe Bay, as well as being in the direct line of the road called Danes’ Pad, the track usually taken by the Northmen in former incursions into the Fylde and county. In addition it may be mentioned that tradition affirms that a large quantity of human bones were ploughed up in a field between Burn and Poulton about a century ago. Sharon Turner says:—“It is singular that the position of this famous battle is not yet ascertained. The Saxon song says it was at Brunanburgh; Ethelwerd, a contemporary, names the place Brunandune. These of course are the same place, but where is it?”[11] Having done our best to suggest or rather renew an answer presenting several points worthy of consideration to Mr. Turner’s query, we will, before bidding farewell to the subject, give our readers a translated extract from the old song to which allusion has been made:—

Athelstan king,

Of earls the Lord,

Of Heroes the bracelet giver,

And his brother eke,

Edmund Atheling,

Life-long glory,

In battle won,

With edges of swords,

Near Brunanburgh.

The field was dyed

With warriors blood,

Since the sun, up

At morning tide,

Mighty planet,

Gilded o’er grounds,

God’s candle bright,

The eternal Lord’s,

Till the noble creature

Sank to her rest.

...

West Saxons onwards

Throughout the day,

In numerous bands

Pursued the footsteps

Of the loathed nations.

They hewed the fugitives,

Behind, amain,

With swords mill-sharp.

Mercians refused not

The hard-hand play

To any heroes,

Who with Anlaf,

Over the ocean,

In the ship’s bosom,

This land sought.

...

There was made to flee

The Northmens’ chieftain,

By need constrained,

To the ships prow

With a little band.

The bark drove afloat.

The king departed.

On the fallow flood

His life he preserved.

The Northmen departed

In their nailed barks

On roaring ocean.

Athelstan, in order to encourage commerce and agriculture, enacted that any of the humbler classes, called Ceorls, who had crossed the sea thrice with their own merchandise, or who, individually, possessed five hides of land, a bell-house, a church, a kitchen, and a separate office in the king’s hall, should be raised to the privileged rank of Thane. Sometime in the interval between the death of this monarch, in 941, and the arrival of William the Conqueror, the Hundred of Amounderness had been relinquished by the See of York, probably owing to frequent wars and disturbances having so ruined the country and thinned the inhabitants that the grant had ceased to be profitable.

During the earlier part of the Saxon era the clergy claimed one tenth or tithe of the produce of the soil, and exemption for their monasteries and churches from all taxations. These demands were resisted for a considerable period, but at length were conceded by Ethelwulf “for the honour of God, and for his own everlasting salvation.”[12] In 1002, it is recorded in the Saxon Chronicle, that “the king (Ethelred) ordered all the Danish men who were in England to be slain, because it was made known to him that they would treacherously bereave him of his life, and after that have his kingdom without any gainsaying.” In accordance with the royal mandate, which was circulated in secret, the Anglo-Saxon populace of the villages and farms of the Fylde, as elsewhere, rose at the appointed day upon the unprepared and unsuspecting Northmen, barbarously massacring old and young, male and female alike. Great must have been the slaughter in districts like our own, where from the Danes having been established for so many generations and its proximity to the coast and the estuaries of Wyre and Ribble, a safe landing and a friendly soil would be insured, and attract numbers of their countrymen from Scandinavia. The vengeance of Sweyn, king of Denmark, was speedy and complete; the country of Northumbria was laid waste, towns and hamlets were pillaged and destroyed, and for four years all that fire and sword, spurred on by hatred and revenge, could effect in depopulating and devastating a land was accomplished in Lancashire, and the neighbouring counties, by the enraged Dane. Half a century later than the events just narrated, earl Tosti, the brother of Harold, who forfeited his life and kingdom to the Norman invaders on the field of Hastings, was chosen duke of Northumbria. The seat of the new ruler has not been discovered, but as far as his personal association with the Fylde is concerned it will be sufficient to state that almost on its boundaries, in the township of Preston, he held six hundred acres of cultivated soil, to which all the lands and villages of Amounderness were tributary. As a governor Tosti proved himself both brutal and oppressive. In a very limited space of time his tyrannical and merciless conduct goaded his subjects to rebellion, and with one consent they ejected him from his dukedom and elected earl Morcar in his stead, a step commended and confirmed by Harold, when the unjust severity of his brother had been made known to him. Tosti embraced the Norman cause, and fell at the head of a Norwegian force in an engagement which took place at Standford a few months before the famous and eventful battle of Hastings.

We have now traced briefly the history of the Fylde through a period of eleven hundred years, and before entering on the era which dates from the accession of William the Conqueror, it will be well to review the traces and influences of the three dissimilar races, which have at different epochs usurped and settled on the territory of the old Setantii; our reference is, of course, to the Romans, Anglo-Saxons, and Danes. Under the first, great advances were made in civilisation; clearings were effected in the woods, the marshes were trenched, and lasting lines of communication were established between the various stations and encampments. The peaceful arts were cultivated, and agriculture made considerable progress, corn even, from some parts of Britain, being exported to the continent. Remains of the Roman occupation are to be observed in the names of a few towns, as Colne and Lincoln, from Colonia, a Colony, also Chester and Lancaster, from Castra, a Camp, as well as in relics like those enumerated earlier. The word “street” is derived from Stratum, a layer, covering, or pavement. Their festival of Flora originated our May-day celebrations, and the paraphernalia of marriage, including the ring, veil, gifts, bride-cake, bridesmaids, and groomsmen, are Roman; so also are the customs of strewing flowers upon graves, and wearing black in time of mourning. That the Romans had many stations in the Fylde is improbable, but that they certainly had one in the township of Kirkham is shown by the number and character of the relics found there. This settlement would seem to have been a fairly populous one, if an opinion may be formed from the quantity of cinereal urns discovered at various times, in which had been deposited the cremated remains of Romans, who had spent their days and done good service in levelling the forests and developing the resources of the Fylde. The traffic over the Roman road through the district must have been almost continuous, to judge from the abundance of horse-shoes and other matters picked up along its route, and whether the harbour of the Setantii was on Wyre, Ribble, or elsewhere, it is evident from the course taken by the well constructed path that something of importance, say a favourable spot for embarcation or debarcation, attracted the inhabitants across the soil of the Fylde towards its north-west boundary. Now arises the question what was the boundary here denoted, and in reply we venture to suggest that the extent of this district, in both a northerly and westerly direction, was much greater in ancient days than it is in our own, and that the Lune formed its highest boundary, whilst its seaward limits, opposite Rossall, were carried out to a distance of nearly eight miles beyond the existing coast, and comprised what is now denominated Shell Wharf, a bank so shallowly covered at low water spring tides that huge boulders become visible all over it. Novel as such a theory may at first sight appear, there is much that can be advanced in support of it. From about the point in Morecambe Bay, near the foot of Wyre Lighthouse, where the stream of Wyre meets that of Lune at right angles, there is the commencement of a long deep channel, apparently continuous with the bed of the latter river as defined by its sandbanks, which extends out into the Irish Sea for rather more than seven miles west of the mouth of Morecambe Bay, at Rossall Point. This channel, called “Lune Deep,” is described on the authorised charts as being in several places twenty-seven fathoms deep, in others rather less, and at its somewhat abrupt termination twenty-three fathoms. Throughout the entire length its boundaries are well and clearly marked, and its sudden declivity is described by the local mariners as being “steep as a house side.” Regarding this curious phenomenon from every available point of view, it seems more probable to us that so long and perfect a channel was formed at an early period, when the river Lune was, as we conjecture, continued from its present mouth, at Heysham Point, through green plains, now the Bay of Lancaster, in the direction and to the distance of “Lune Deep,” than that it was excavated by the current of Lune, as it exists to-day, after mingling with the waters of Morecambe and Wyre. The course and completeness of Wyre channel from Fleetwood, between the sandbanks called Bernard’s Wharf and North Wharf, to its point of junction with the stream from Lancaster, prove satisfactorily that at one time the former river was a tributary of the Lune. Other evidence can be brought forward of the theory we are wishful to establish—that the southern portion of Morecambe Bay, from about Heysham Point, bearing the name of Lancaster Bay, as well as “Shell Wharf” was about the era of the Romans, dry or, at least, marshy land watered by the Wyre and Lune, the latter of which would open on the west coast immediately into the Irish Sea. If the reader refer to a map of Lancashire he will see at once that the smaller bay has many appearances of having been added to the larger one, and that its floor is formed by a continuous line of banks, uncovered each ebb tide and intersected only by the channels of Wyre and Lune. The Land Mark, at Rossall Point, has been removed several times owing to the incursions of the sea, and within the memory of the living generation wide tracts of soil, amounting to more than a quarter of a mile westward, have been swallowed up on that part of the coast, as the strong currents of the rising tides have swept into the bay; and in such manner would the land about the estuary of “Lune Deep,” that is the original river of Lune, be washed away. As the encroachments of the sea progressed, the channel of the river would be gradually widened and deepened to the present dimensions of the “Deep”; the stream of Wyre would by degrees be brought more immediately under the tidal influence, and in proportion as the Lune was absorbed into the bay, so would its tributary lose its shallowness and insignificance, and become expanded to a more important and navigable size. About the time that “Lune Deep” had ceased to exist as a river, and become part of the bay, the overcharged banks of the Wyre would have yielded up their super-abundance of waters over the districts now marked by Bernard’s Wharf and North Wharf, and subsequently, as the waves continued their incursions, inundations would increase, until finally the whole territory, forming the site of Lancaster Bay, would be submerged and appropriated by the rapacious hosts of Neptune. The “Shell Wharf” would be covered in a manner exactly similar to the more recently lost fields off Rossall; and as illustrations of land carried away from the west coast in that neighbourhood, may be instanced a farm called Fenny, at Rossall, which was removed back from threatened destruction by the waves at least four times within the last fifty years, when its re-building was abandoned, and its site soon swept over by the billows; also the village of Singleton Thorp, which occupied the locality marked by “Singleton Skeer” off Cleveleys until 1555, when it was destroyed by an irruption of the sea. Numerous other instances in which the coast line has been altered and driven eastward, between Rossall Point and the mouth of Ribble, during both actually and comparatively modern days might be cited, but the above are sufficient to support our view of the former connection of “Shell Wharf” with the main-land, and its gradual submersion. If on the map, the Bay of Lancaster be detached from that of Morecambe, the latter still retains a most imposing aspect, and its identity with the Moricambe Æstuarium of Ptolemy is in no way interfered with or rendered less evident. The foregoing, as our antiquarian readers will doubtless have surmised, is but a prelude to something more, for it is our purpose to endeavour to disturb the forty years of quiet repose enjoyed by the Portus Setantiorum on the banks of the Wyre and hurl it far into the Irish Sea, to the very limits of the “Lune Deep,” where, on the original estuary of the river Lune, we believe to be its legitimate home. No locality, as yet claiming to be the site of the ancient harbour, accords so well with the distances given by Ptolemy. Assuming the Dee and the Ribble to represent respectively, as now generally admitted, the Seteia Æstuarium and the Belisama Æstuarium, the Portus Setantiorum should lie about seven miles[13] to the west and twenty-five to the north of the Belisama. The position of the “Lune Deep” termination is just about seven miles to the west of the estuary of the Ribble, but is, like most other places whose stations have been mentioned by Ptolemy, defective in its latitudinal measurement according to the record left by that geographer, being only fifteen instead of twenty-five miles north of the Belisama or Ribble estuary. Rigodunum, or Ribchester, is fully thirty miles to the east of the spot where it is wished to locate the Portus, and thus approaches very nearly to the forty-mile measurement of Ptolemy, whose distances, as just hinted, were universally excessive. As an instance of such error it may be stated that the longitude, east from Ferro, of Morecambe Bay or Estuary given by Ptolemy, is 3° 40´ in excess of that marked on modern maps of ancient Britannia, and if the same over-plus be allowed in the longitude of the Portus Setantiorum a line drawn in accordance, from north to south, would pass across the west extremity of the “Lune Deep,” showing that its distance from the Bay corresponds pretty accurately with that of the Portus from the Morecambe Æstuarium as geographically fixed by Ptolemy. In describing the extent and direction of the Roman road, or Danes’ Pad, in his “History of Blackpool and Neighbourhood,” Mr. Thornber writes:—“Commencing at the terminus, we trace its course from the Warren, near the spot named the ‘Abbot’s walk’;” but that the place thus indicated was not the terminus, in the sense of end or origin, is proved by the fact that shortly after the publication of this statement, the workmen engaged in excavating for a sea-wall foundation in that vicinity came upon the road in the sand on the very margin of the Warren. Hence it would seem that the path was continued onwards over the site of the North Wharf sand bank, either towards the foot of Wyre where its channel joins that of Lune, and where would be the original mouth of the former river, or, as we think more probable, towards the Lune itself, and along its banks westward to the estuary of the stream, as now marked by the termination of “Lune Deep.” The Wyre, during the period it existed simply as a tributary of the Lune, a name very possibly compounded from the Celtic al, chief, and aun, or un, contractions of afon, a river, must have been a stream of comparatively slight utility in a navigable point of view, and even to this day its seaward channel from Fleetwood is obstructed by two shallows, denominated from time out of mind the Great and Little Fords. The Lune, or “Chief River,” on the contrary, was evidently, from its very title, whether acquired from its relative position to its tributary, or from its favourable comparison with other rivers of the neighbourhood, which is less likely, regarded by the natives as a stream of no insignificant magnitude and importance. As far as its navigability was concerned the Portus may have been placed on its banks near to the junction of Wyre, but the distances of Ptolemy, which agree pretty fairly, as shown above, with the location of the Portus on the west extremity of the present “Lune Deep,” are incompatible with such a station as this one for the same harbour. The collection of coins discovered near Rossall may imply the existence in early days of a settlement west of that shore, and many remains of the Romans may yet be mingled with the sand and shingle for centuries submerged by the water of the still encroaching Irish Sea. Leaving this long-argued question of the real site of the Portus Setantiorum, in which perhaps the patience of our readers has been rather unduly tried, and soliciting others to test more thoroughly the merits of the ideas here thrown out, we will hasten to examine the traces of the Anglo-Saxons and Danes.

Many, in fact most, of the towns and villages of the Fylde were founded by the Anglo-Saxons, and have retained the names, generally in a modified form, bestowed upon them by that race, as instance Singleton, Lytham, Mythorp, all of which have Saxon terminals signifying a dwelling, village, or enclosure. The word hearb, genitive hearges, indicates in the vocabulary of the same people a heathen temple or place of sacrifice, and as it is to be traced in the endings of Goosnargh, and Kellamergh, there need be no hesitation in surmising that the barbarous and pagan rites of the Saxons were celebrated there, before their conversion to Christianity. Ley, or lay, whether at the beginning of a name, as in Layton, or at end, as in Boonley, signifies a field, and is from the Saxon leag; whilst Hawes and Holme imply, respectively, a group of thorps or hamlets, and a river island. Breck, Warbreck, and Larbreck, derive their final syllables from the Norse brecka, a gentle rise; and from that language comes also the terminal by, in Westby, Ribby, and other places, as well as the kirk in Kirkham, all of which point out the localities occupied by the Danes, or Norsemen. Lund was doubtless the site of a sacred grove of these colonists and the scene of many a dark and cruel ceremony, its derivation being from the ancient Norse lundr, a consecrated grove, where such rites were performed.

At the present time it is difficult, if indeed possible, to determine from what races our own native population has descended, and the subject is one which has provoked more than a little controversy. Palgrave, in his “History of the Anglo-Saxons,” says:—“From the Ribble in Lancashire, or thereabouts, up to the Clyde, there existed a dense population composed of Britons, who preserved their national language and customs, agreeing in all respects with the Welsh of the present day; so that even to the tenth century the ancient Britons still inhabited the greater part of the west coast of the island, however much they had been compelled to yield to the political supremacy of the Saxon invaders.” Mr. Thornber states that he has been “frequently told by those who were reputed judges” that the manners, customs, and dialect of the Fylde partook far more of the Welsh than of the Saxon, and that this was more perceptible half a century ago than now (1837). “The pronunciation,” he adds, “of the words—laughing, toffee, haughendo, etc., the Shibboleth of the Fylde—always reminds me of the deep gutterals of the Welsh,[14] and the frequent use of a particular oath is, alas! too common to both.” Another investigator, Dr. Robson, holds an entirely different opinion, and maintains in his paper on Lancashire and Cheshire, that there is no sufficient foundation for the common belief that the inhabitants of any portion of those counties have been at any time either Welsh, or Celtic; and that the Celtic tribes at the earliest known period were confined to certain districts, which may be traced, together with the extent of their dominions, by the Celtic names of places both in Wales and Cornwall. From another source we are informed that at the date of the Roman abdication the original Celtic population would have dwindled down to an insignificant number acting as serfs and tillers of the land, and not likely to have much influence upon future generations. Mr. Hardwick, in his History of Preston, writes:—“Few women would accompany the Roman colonists, auxiliaries, and soldiers into Britain; hence it is but rational to conclude, that during the long period of their dominion, numerous intermarriages with the native population would take place.” Admitting the force of reasoning brought forward by the last authority, it can readily be conceived that the purity of the aboriginal tribes would in a great measure be destroyed at an early epoch, and that subsequent alliances with the Anglo-Saxons, Danes, and Normans, have rendered all conjectures as to the race of forefathers to which the inhabitants of the Fylde have most claim practically valueless.

The dense forests with which our district in the earliest historic periods abounded must have been well supplied with beasts of chase, whereon the Aborigines exercised their courage and craft, and from which their clothing and, in a great measure, their sustenance were derived. The large branching horns of the Wild Deer have been found in the ground at Larbrick, and during the excavations for the North Union and East Lancashire Railway Bridges over the Ribble, in 1838 and 1846 respectively, numerous remains of the huge ox, called the Bos primigenius, and the Bos longifrons, or long-faced ox, as well as of wild boars and bears, were raised from beneath the bed of the river, so that it is extremely likely that similar relics of the brute creation are lying deeply buried in our soil. Such a supposition is at least warranted by the discovery, half-a-century ago, of the skull and short upright horns of a stag and those of an ox, of a breed no longer known, at the bottom of a marl pit near Rossall. Bones and sculls, chiefly those of deer and oxen, have been taken from under the peat in all the mosses, and two osseous relics, consisting each of skull and horns, of immense specimens of the latter animal, have been dug up at Kirkham. In the “Reliquiæ Diluvianæ” of Mr. Buckland is a figure of the scull of a rhinoceros belonging to the antediluvian age, and stated to have been discovered beneath a moss in Lancashire.

CHAPTER II.
THE NORMAN CONQUEST TO JAMES THE FIRST.

When the battle of Hastings, in 1066, had terminated in favour of William the Conqueror, and placed him on the throne of England, he indulged his newly acquired power in many acts of tyranny towards the vanquished nation, subjecting the old nobility to frequent indignities, weakening the sway of the Church, and impoverishing the middle and lower classes of the community. This harsh policy spread dissatisfaction and indignation through all ranks of the people, and it was not long before rebellion broke out in the old province of Northumbria. The Lancastrians and others, under the earls Morcar and Edwin, rose up in revolt, slew the Norman Baron set over them, and were only reduced to order and submission when William appeared on the scene at the head of an overwhelming force. The two earls escaped across the frontier to Scotland, and for some inexplicable reason were permitted to retain their possessions in Lancashire and elsewhere, while the common insurgents were afterwards treated with great severity and cruelty by their Norman rulers. Numerous castles were now erected in the north of England to hold the Saxons in subjection, and guard against similar outbreaks in future. Those at Lancaster and Liverpool were built by a Norman Baron of high position, named Roger de Poictou, the third son of Robert de Montgomery, earl of Arundel and Shrewsbury. When William divided the conquered territory amongst his followers, the Honor[15] of Lancaster and the Hundred of Amounderness fell, amongst other gifts, amounting in all to three hundred and ninety-eight manors,[16] to that nobleman, and, as he resided during a large portion of his time at the castle erected on the banks of the Lune, our district would receive a greater share of attention than his more distant possessions.

After the country had been restored to peace, William determined to institute an inquiry into the condition and resources of his kingdom. The records of the survey were afterwards bound up in two volumes, which received the name of the Domesday Book, from Dome, a census, and Boc, a book.

The king’s commands to the investigators were, according to the Saxon Chronicle, to ascertain—“How many hundreds of hydes were in each shire, what lands the king himself had, and what stock there was upon the land; or what dues he ought to have by the year from each shire. Also he commissioned them to record in writing, how much land his archbishops had and his diocesan bishops, and his abbots and his earls; what or how much each man had, who was an occupier of land in England, either in land or stock, and how much money it was worth. So very narrowly, indeed, did he commission them to trace it out, that there was not one single hide, nor a yard of land; nay, moreover (it is shameful to tell, though he thought it no shame to do it), not even an ox, nor a cow, nor a swine, was there left that was not set down in his writ.” The examination was commenced in 1080, and six years afterwards the whole of the laborious task was accomplished. In this compilation the county of Lancaster is never once mentioned by name, but the northern portion is joined to the Yorkshire survey, and the southern to that of Cheshire.

The following is a translation of that part of Domesday Book relating to the Fylde:—

Agemundernesse under Evrvic—scire (Yorkshire).

Poltun (Poulton), two carucates;[17] Rushale (Rossall), two carucates; Brune (Burn), two carucates; Torentun (Thornton), six carucates; Carlentun (Carleton), four carucates; Meretun (Marton), six carucates; Staininghe (Staining), six carucates.

Biscopham (Bispham), eight carucates; Latun (Layton), six carucates.

Chicheham (Kirkham), four carucates; Salewic (Salwick), one carucate; Cliftun (Clifton), two carucates; Newtune (Newton-with-Scales), two carucates; Frecheltune (Freckleton), four carucates; Rigbi (Ribby-with-Wray), six carucates; Treueles (Treales), two carucates; Westbi (Westby), two carucates; Pluntun (Plumptons), two carucates; Widetun (Weeton), three carucates; Pres (Preese), two carucates; Midehope (Mythorp), one carucate; Wartun (Warton), four carucates; Singletun (Singleton), six carucates; Greneholf (Greenhalgh), three carucates; Hameltune (Hambleton), two carucates.

Lidun (Lytham), two carucates.

Michelescherche (St. Michael’s-on-Wyre), one carucate; Pluntun (Wood Plumpton) five carucates; Rodecliff (Upper Rawcliffe), two carucates; Rodecliff (Middle Rawcliffe), two carucates; a third Rodecliff (Out Rawcliffe), three carucates; Eglestun (Ecclestons), two carucates; Edeleswic (Elswick), three carucates; Inscip (Inskip), two carucates; Sorbi (Sowerby), one carucate.

All these vills belong to Prestune (Preston); and there are three churches (in Amounderness). In sixteen of these vills[18] there are but few inhabitants—but how many there are is not known.

The rest are waste. Roger de Poictou had [the whole].

When we read the concluding remark—“The rest are waste,” and observe the insignificant proportion of the many thousands of acres comprised in the Fylde at that time under cultivation, we are made forcibly cognizant of the truly deplorable condition to which the district had been reduced by ever-recurring warfare through a long succession of years. There is no guide to the number of the inhabitants, excepting, perhaps, the existence of only three churches in the whole Hundred of Amounderness, and this can scarcely be admitted as certain evidence of the paucity of the population, as in the harassed and unsettled state in which they lived it is not very probable that the people would be much concerned about the public observances of religious ceremonials or services. The churches alluded to were situated at Preston, Kirkham, and St. Michael’s-on-Wyre. The parish church at Poulton was the next one erected, and appears to have been standing less than ten years after the completion of the Survey, for Roger de Poictou, when he founded the priory of St. Mary, Lancaster, in 1094, endowed it with—“Pulton in Agmundernesia, and whatsoever belonged to it, and the church, with one carucate of land, and all other things belonging to it.”[19] The terminal paragraph of the foundation-charter of the monastery states that Geoffrey, the sheriff, having heard of the liberal grants of Roger de Poictou, also bestowed upon it—“the tithes of Biscopham, whatever he had in Lancaster, some houses, and an orchard.” It is difficult to determine whether a church existed in the township of Bispham at that date or not, but as no such edifice is included in the above list of benefactions, we are inclined to believe that it was not erected until later. The earliest mention of it occurs in the reign of Richard I., 1189 to 1199, when Theobald Walter quitclaimed to the abbot of Sees “all his right in the advowson of Pulton, with the church of Biscopham.”[20]

The rebellious and ungrateful conduct of Roger de Poictou ultimately led to his banishment out of the country, and the forfeiture of the whole of his extensive possessions to the crown. The Hundred of Amounderness was conveyed by the King on the 22nd of April, 1194, being the fifth year of his reign, to Theobald Walter, the son of Hervens, a Norman who had accompanied the Conqueror. “Be it known,” says the document, “that we give and confirm to Theobald Walter the whole of Amounderness with its appurtenances by the service of three Knights’ fees, namely, all the domain thereto belonging, all the services of the Knights who hold of the fee of Amounderness by Knight’s service, all the service of the Free-tenants of Amounderness, all the Forest of Amounderness, with all the Venison, and all the Pleas of the Forest.” His rights “are to be freely and quietly allowed,” continues the deed, “in wood and plain, in meadows and pastures, in highways and footpaths, in waters and mills, in mill-ponds, in fish-ponds and fishings, in peat-lands, moors and marshes, in wreck of the sea, in fairs and markets, in advowsons and chapelries, and in all liberties and free customs.” Amongst the barons of Lancashire given in the MSS. of Percival is—“Theobald Walter, baron of Weeton and Amounderness,” but, as Weeton never existed as a barony, it is clear that the former title is an error. The “Black Book of the Exchequer,” the oldest record after the “Domesday Book,” has entered in it the tenants and fees de veteri feoffamento[21] and de novo feoffamento,[22] and amongst others is a statement that Theobald Walter held Amounderness by the service of one Knight, thus the later charter, just quoted, must be regarded as a confirmation of a previous grant, and not as an original donation. He was an extensive founder of monastic houses, and amongst the abbeys established by him was that of Cockersand, which he endowed with the whole Hay of Pylin (Pilling) in Amounderness. He was appointed sheriff of the county of Lancaster by Richard I. in 1194, and retained the office until the death of that monarch five years afterwards. His son, Theobald, married Maud, sister to the celebrated Thomas à Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, and assumed the title of his office when created Chief Butler of Ireland. The family of the same name which inhabited Rawcliffe Hall until that property was confiscated through the treasonable part played by Henry Butler and his son Richard in the rebellion of 1715, was directly descended from Theobald Walter-Butler. The Butlers of Kirkland, the last of whom, Alexander Butler, died in 1811, and was succeeded by a great-nephew, were also representatives of the ancient race of Walter, and preserved the line unbroken. Theobald Walter, the elder, died in 1206, and Amounderness reverted to the crown.

Richard I. a few years before his death presented the Honor of Lancaster to his brother, the earl of Moreton, who subsequently became King John, and it is asserted that this nobleman, when residing at the castle of Lancaster, was occasionally a guest at Staining Hall, and that during one of his visits he so admired the strength and skill displayed by a person called Geoffrey, and surnamed the Crossbowman, that he induced him to join his retinue. How far truth has been embellished and disguised by fiction in this traditional statement we are unable to conjecture, but there are reasonable grounds for believing that the story is not entirely supposititious, for the earl of Moreton granted to Geoffrey l’Arbalistrier, or the Crossbowman, who is said to have been a younger brother of Theobald Walter, senior, six carucates of land in Hackinsall-with-Preesall, and a little later, the manor of Hambleton, most likely as rewards for military or other services rendered to that nobleman. John, as earl of Moreton, appears to have gained the affection and respect of the inhabitants of Lancashire by his liberal practices during his long sojourns in their midst. He granted a charter to the knights, thanes, and freeholders of the county, whereby they and their heirs, without challenge or interference from him and his heirs, were permitted to fell, sell, and give, at their pleasure, their forest woods, without being subject to the forest regulations, and to hunt and take hares, foxes, rabbits, and all kinds of wild beasts, excepting stags, hinds, roebucks, and wild hogs, in all parts within his forests beyond the desmesne hays of the county.[23] On ascending the throne, however, he soon aroused the indignation of all sections of his subjects by his meanness, pride, and utter inability to govern the kingdom. His indolent habits excited the disgust of a nobility, whose regular custom was to breakfast at five and dine at nine in the morning, as proclaimed by the following popular Norman proverb:—

Lever à cinque, dîner à neuf,

Souper à cinque, coucher à neuf,

Fait vivre d’ans nonante et neuf.[24]

Eventually his evil actions and foolish threats so incensed the nation, that the barons, headed by William, earl of Pembroke, compelled him, in 1215, to sign the Magna Charta, a code of laws embodying two important principles—the general rights of the freemen, and the limitation of the powers of both king and pope.

About that time it would have been almost, if not quite, impossible to have decided or described what was the national language of the country. The services at the churches were read in Latin, the aristocracy indulged only in Norman-French, whilst the great mass of the people spoke a language, usually denominated Saxon or English, but which had been so mutilated and altered by additions from various sources that the ancient “Settlers on the shores of the German Ocean” would scarcely have recognized it as their native tongue. Each division of the kingdom had its peculiar dialect, very much as now, and from the remarks of a southern writer, named Trevisa, it must be inferred that the patois of our own district, which he would include in the old province of Northumbria,[25] was far from either elegant or musical. “Some,” he says, “use strange gibbering, chattering, waffling, and grating; then the Northumbre’s tongue is so sharp, flitting, floyting, and unshape, that we Southron men may not understand that language.” Such a list of curious and uncomplimentary epithets inclines us at first sight to doubt the strict impartiality of their author, but when it is remembered that, in spite of the greatly increased opportunities for education and facilities for intercommunion amongst the different classes, the provincialisms of some of our own peasantry would be utterly unintelligible to many of us at the present day, we are constrained to admit that Trevisa may have had just reason for his remarks.

In 1268 the Honor of Lancaster, the Wapentake of Amounderness, and the manors of Preston, Ribby-with-Wray, and Singleton were given by Henry III. to his son Edmund Crouchback, and in addition the king published an edict forbidding the sheriffs of neighbouring counties to enter themselves, or send, or permit their bailiffs to enter or interfere with anything belonging to the Honor of Lancaster, or to the men of that Honor, unless required to do so by his son. Edmund was also created earl of Lancaster, and became the founder of that noble house, whose possessions and power afterwards attained to such magnitude as to place its representative, Henry IV., upon the throne, although nearer descendants of his grandfather Edward III. were still living.

We have now arrived at the unsettled era, comprising the reigns of the three Edwards and Richard II., and during the whole of the time these monarchs wore the crown, a period of one hundred and twenty-six years, the nation was engaged in continual wars—with the Welsh under Llewellyn, the Scotch under Bruce and Wallace, and the French under Philip. The reign of Richard II. was additionally agitated by the insurrection of Wat Tyler. Looking at that long uninterrupted season of excitement, we cease to wonder at the riotous and disorganized state into which society was thrown. The rulers, whether local and subordinate, or those of a higher grade, were too actively engaged in forwarding the efficiency of the army, to devote much attention to the welfare and proper government of the people. Crimes and disturbances were allowed to pass unpunished, and evil-doers, being thus encouraged to prosecute their unlawful purposes, carried their outrages to the very confines of open rebellion against all power and order. It was not until such a dangerous climax had been reached that a commission, consisting of the following judges, Peter de Bradbate, Edmund Deyncourt, William de Vavasour, John de Island, and Adam de Middleton, was appointed to deal summarily and severely with all offenders in the counties of Lancaster and Westmoreland. During those troublesome times Sir Adam Banastre and a number of others assaulted Ralph de Truno, prior of Lancaster, and his train of attendants at Poulton-le-Fylde, seized and carried him off to Thornton, where they brutally ill-used and finally imprisoned him. An inquiry into the disgraceful proceeding was instituted by order of Edward I., but the result has not been preserved, at least no record of it has as yet been discovered amongst any of the ancient documents concerning this county. Leyland, who was antiquary to Henry VIII., alluding to the death of the disorderly knight, says,—“Adam Banastre, a bachelar of Lancastershire, moved ryot agayne Thomas of Lancaster by kraft of kynge Edward II., but he was taken and behedid by the commandment of Thomas of Lancaster.” The first part of the quotation has reference to a quarrel between the earl of Lancaster and Sir Adam, who for his own aggrandizement and to curry favour with the king, as well as to divert the attention of that monarch from his own misdeeds, declared that Thomas of Lancaster wished to interfere with the royal prerogative in the choice of ministers; and, professedly, to punish such presumption he invaded the domains of that nobleman. An encounter took place in the valley of the Ribble, not far from Preston, in which the followers of Sir Adam were vanquished and put to flight. Their leader secreted himself in a barn on his own lands, but, being discovered by the soldiers of his opponent, was dragged forth and beheaded with a sword. Subjoined is an account of a disturbance which occurred at Kirkham during the same period, transcribed from the Vale Royal[26] register:—“A narrative of proceedings in a dispute between the abbot of Vale Royal, and Sir Will. de Clifton, knt., respecting the tithes in the manor of Clifton and Westby, in the parish of Kirkham, A.D. 1337, in the time of Peter’s abbacy. The charges alleged against Sir William state, that he had obtained twenty marks[27] due to the abbot; had forcibly obstructed the rector in the gathering of tithes within the manor of Clifton and Westby; seized his loaded wain, and brought ridicule on his palfrey: that he had also burst, with his armed retainers, into the parish church of Kirkham, and thereby deterred his clerks from the performance of divine service; had prevented the parishioners from resorting to the font for the rite of baptism; and that, having seized on Thomas, the clerk of the abbot of Vale Royal, he had inflicted on him a flagellation in the public streets of Preston. After a complaint, made to the abbot of Westminster, a conservator of the rights and privileges of the order to which Vale Royal belonged, Sir William confessed his fault and threw himself on the mercy of the abbot of the Cheshire convent, who contented himself, after receiving a compensation for his rector’s losses, with an oath from the refractory knight, that he would in future maintain and defend the privileges of the abbey, and would bind himself in forty shillings to offer no further violence to the unfortunate secretary of the abbot.”

During the reign of Edward III., Henry, earl of Lancaster, was created duke of the county with the consent of the prelates and peers assembled in parliament. This nobleman, whose pious and generous actions earned for him the title of the “Good duke of Lancaster,” received a mandate from the king during the war with France, when there were serious apprehensions of an invasion by that nation, to arm all the lancers on his estates, and to set a strict watch over the seacoasts of Lancashire. These precautions, however, proved unnecessary, as the French made no attempt to cross the channel. In his will, bearing the date 1361, (the year of his death), Duke Henry bequeathed the Wappentakes or Hundreds of Amounderness, Lonsdale, and Leyland, with other estates, to his daughter Blanche, who had married John of Gaunt, the earl of Richmond and fourth son of Edward III. John of Gaunt succeeded to the dukedom in right of his wife.

“In the ‘Testa de Nevill’,” a register extending from 1274 to 1327, and containing, amongst other matters, a list of the fees and serjeanties holden of the king and the churches in his gift, it is stated under the latter heading:—“St. Michael upon Wyre; the son of Count Salvata had it by gift of the present king, and he says, that he is elected into a bishoprick, and that the church is vacant, and worth 30 marks[28] per an. Kyrkeham; King John gave two parts of it to Simon Blundel, on account of his custody of the son and heir of Theobald Walter. Worth 80 marks[29] per an.” In another part of these records it is named that Richard de Frekelton held fees in chief in Freckleton, Newton, and Eccleston; Alan de Singilton, in Singleton, Freckleton, Newton, and Elswick; and Adam de Merton, in Marton; also that Fitz Richard held serjeanties in Singleton, by serjeanty of Amounderness.

The earliest intimation of members being returned to represent our own district, in conjunction with the other divisions of the county, is to the parliament of Edward I., assembled in 1295, when Matthew de Redmand and John de Ewyas were elected knights of the shire for Lancaster, and in his report the sheriff adds—“There is no city in the county of Lancaster.” The members of parliament in 1297 were Henricus de Kigheley and Henricus le Botyler; in 1302 Willielmus de Clifton and Gilbertus de Singleton; and in 1304 Willielmus de Clifton and Willielmus Banastre. Henricus le Botyler, or Butler, belonged to the family of the Butlers of Rawcliffe; Gilbertus de Singleton was probably connected with the Singletons whose descendants resided at Staining Hall; Willielmus de Clifton was an ancestor of the Cliftons of Lytham, and here it may be stated that Lancashire was represented in 1383 by Robt. de Clifton, of Westby, and Ric’us de Hoghton; and in 1844 by J. Wilson Patten, now Lord Winmarleigh, and Jno. Talbot Clifton, esq., of Lytham Hall. Thos. Henry Clifton, esq., son of the last gentleman, and the Hon. F. A. Stanley are the present members for North Lancashire.

During the Scottish wars of Edward III., John de Coupland, of Upper Rawcliffe, valiantly captured David II., king of Scotland, at the battle of Durham, and although that monarch dashed out Coupland’s teeth and used every means to incite the latter to slay him, the brave soldier restrained his wrath and delivered up his prisoner alive. For that signal service Edward rewarded him with a grant of £500 per annum, until he could receive an equivalent in land wherever he might choose, and created him a knight banneret.[30] “I have seen,” says Camden, “a charter of King Edward III., by which he advanced John Coupland to the state of a banneret in the following words, because in a battle fought at Durham he had taken prisoner David the Second, King of Scots:—‘Being willing to reward the said John, who took David de Bruis prisoner, and frankly delivered him unto us, for the deserts of his honest and valiant service, in such sort as others may take example by his precedent to do us faithful service in time to come, we have promoted the said John to the place and degree of a banneret; and, for the maintenance of the same state, we have granted, for us and our heirs, to the same John, five hundred pounds by the year, to be received by him and his heirs’,” etc.

For some time after a truce had been concluded with Scotland, the war, in which the incident narrated occurred, continued with little abatement, and in 1322 this county with others was called upon to raise fresh levies. These constant drains upon its resources, and the devastations committed by riotous companies of armed men, so impoverished our district that the inhabitants of Poulton forwarded a petition to the Pope, praying him to forego his claims upon their town on account of the deplorably distressed condition to which they had been reduced. The taxations of all churches in the Fylde were greatly lowered in consideration of the indigency of the people; that of Kirkham from 240 marks per annum to 120, and the others in like proportion. Further evidence of the poverty of this division may be gathered from a census taken in 1377, which states, amongst other things, that—“There is no town worthy of notice anywhere in the whole of the county”; and again, twenty years later, when a loan was raised to meet the enormous expenditure of the country, Lancashire furnished no contributors.

In 1389, during the reign of Richard II., it was enacted, with a view to the preservation and improvement of the salmon fisheries throughout the kingdom, “that no young salmon be taken or destroyed by nets, at mill-dams or other places, from the middle of April to the Nativity of St. John Baptist”; and special reference is made to this neighbourhood in the following sentence of the bill:—“It is ordained and assented, that the waters of Lone, Wyre, Mersee, Ribbyl, and all other waters in the county of Lancaster, be put in defence, as to the taking of Salmons, from Michaelmas Day to the Purification of our Lady (2nd of February), and in no other time of the year, because that salmons be not seasonable in the said waters in the time aforesaid; and in the parts where such rivers be, there shall be assigned and sworn good and sufficient conservators of this statute.” The foregoing is the earliest regulation of the kind, and the wisdom and utility of its provisions are evinced by the existence of similar measures at the present day.

From the annals of the Duchy may be learnt some interesting particulars relative to changes in ownership at that period of certain portions of the territory comprised in the Fylde. In 1380 John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, issued a “precept to the Escheator to give seisin of the Lands of William Botyler in Layton Magna, Layton Parva, Bispham, Warthebrek, and Great Merton,” etc.; and shortly afterwards gave orders to “seize the Lands of William Botyler.” In 1385 mandates were issued by the same nobleman to his Escheator to “seize into the Hands of the King and himself the Lands of Thomas Banastre, (deceased, 1384), in Ethelswyk, Frekculton, Claughton in Amoundernes, Syngleton Parva, Hamylton, Stalmyn,” etc.; also those of “Emund Banastre, (deceased, 1384), in Wodeplumpton, Preston,” etc. In the Rolls the subjoined entries also occur:—

There is nothing of interest or importance to recount affecting the Fylde from the death of Richard II. until the year 1455, when the battle of St. Albans, resulting in the defeat of Henry VI. and the royal forces by the Duke of York, initiated those lamentable struggles between the rival houses of York and Lancaster; and the inhabitants of our section shared, like the rest, in the ruin and bloodshed of civil war. Those contests, which lasted no less than thirty years, and included thirteen pitched battles, were finally terminated in 1485, by the union of Henry VII. with Catherine of York, daughter of Edward IV.

In 1485 a malady called the “Sweating Sickness” visited the different districts of Lancashire, and so rapid and fatal were the effects, that during the seven weeks it prevailed, large numbers of the populace fell victims to its virulence. Lord Verulam, describing the disease, says:—“The complaint was a pestilent fever, attended by a malign vapour, which flew to the heart and seized the vital spirits; which stirred nature to strive to send it forth by an extreme sweat.”

In 1487 the impostor Lambert Simnel, who personated Edward, earl of Warwick, the heir in rightful succession to Edward IV., landed at the Pile of Fouldrey, (Peel harbour) in Morecambe Bay, with an army raised chiefly by the aid of the Duchess of Burgundy, and marched into the country. At Stoke, near Newark, he was defeated and taken prisoner, and subsequently the adventurer was made a scullion in the king’s kitchen, from which humble sphere he rose by good conduct to the position of falconer. Henry VIII., soon after his accession in 1509, became embroiled in war with France, and whilst he was engaged in hostilities on the continent, James IV. of Scotland crossed the border, and invaded England with a force of fifty thousand men. To resist this aggression large levies were promptly raised in Lancashire and other northern counties, and on the field of Flodden, in Northumberland, a decisive battle took place in 1513, in which the Scottish monarch was slain, and his army routed. The Lancashire troops were led by Sir Edward Stanley, and their patriotism and valour are celebrated in an ancient song called the “Famous Historie or Songe of Floodan Field.” In the following extract certain localities in and near the Fylde are mentioned as having furnished their contingents of willing soldiers:—

“All Lancashire for the most parte

The lusty Standley stowte can lead,

A stock of striplings stronge of heart

Brought up from babes with beef and bread,

From Warton unto Warrington,

From Wiggen unto Wyresdale,

From Weddecon to Waddington,

From Ribchester to Rochdale,

From Poulton to Preston with pikes

They with ye Standley howte forthe went,

From Pemberton and Pilling Dikes

For Battell Billmen bould were bent

With fellowes fearce and fresh for feight

With Halton feilds did turne in foores,

With lusty ladds liver and light

From Blackborne and Bolton in ye moores.”

The office of High Sheriff is one of considerable antiquity, and in early times it was no uncommon thing for the elected person to retain the position for several years together. Annexed is a list of gentlemen connected with the Fylde who have been High Sheriffs of the county of Lancaster at different times, with their years of office:—

It may be here noticed that Edmund Dudley, so notorious in English history as the infamous agent of Henry VII. in the wholesale and scandalous extortions that monarch practised upon his subjects, held many and large territorial possessions in the county of Lancashire, the reward in all probability of his unscrupulous services to the king. After the death of his royal patron a loud outcry for the punishment of Dudley was raised by the nation, and in the first year of Henry VIII. a proclamation was issued inviting those subjects who had been injured by Dudley and his fellow commissioner, Sir Richard Empson, to come forward and state their complaints; the number of complainants who appeared was so great that it was found impossible to examine all their claims, so in order to pacify the universal indignation, the two obnoxious agents were thrown into prison on a charge of treason. From the Inquisition for the Escheat of the Duchy of Lancaster taken on the attainder of Edmund Dudley, in 1509, it is discovered that amongst his numerous estates, were lands in Elswick, Hambleton, Freckleton, Thornton, Little Singleton, Wood Plumpton, Whittingham, Goosnargh, and Claughton. Stow, writing about the circumstances alluded to, says:—“Thereupon was Sir Richard Empson, Knight, and Edmund Dudley, Esquire, by a politicke mean brought into the Tower, where they were accused of treason, and so remained there prisoners, thereby to quiet men’s minds, that made such suit to have their money restored. On the seventeenth of July Edmund Dudley was arraigned in the Guildhall of London, where he was condemned, and had judgement to be drawn, hanged, and quartered.... Henry VIII. sent commandment to the Constable of the Tower, charging him that Empson and Dudley should shortly after be put to execution. The Sheriffs of London were commanded by a special writ to see the said execution performed and done, whereupon they went to the Tower and received the prisoners on the 17th of August, 1510, and from thence brought them unto the scaffold on Tower Hill, where their heads were stricken off.”

The most conspicuous event which happened during the sovereignty of Henry VIII. was the Protestant Reformation. Henry, having quarrelled with the Supreme Head of the Church at Rome, determined to suppress all religious houses in his kingdom whose incomes amounted to less than £200 per annum. Doctors Thomas Leigh and Thomas Layton were appointed to inspect and report on those in Lancashire; and amongst the number condemned on their visit was a small Benedictine Cell at Lytham. This Cell owed its origin to Richard Fitz Roger, who towards the latter part of the reign of Richard I. granted lands at Lytham to the Durham Church, in order that a prior and Benedictine monks might be established there to the honour of St. Mary and St. Cuthbert. Its yearly revenue at the time of suppression was only £55. A little later, in 1540, the larger monastic institutions suffered the fate of the smaller ones; and amongst the chantries closed were two at St. Michael’s-on-Wyre. All Catholic places of worship were closed by a proclamation, bearing the date September 23rd, 1548, and issued by the lord protector Somerset on behalf of the young king Edward VI. On the death of that monarch in 1553 the crown descended to his sister Mary, only daughter of Catherine of Arragon; and one of her first acts was to re-establish the old faith and re-open the churches and chantries which her predecessors had closed. Mass was again celebrated in the churches of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre, Kirkham, and Singleton, as in former days, the officiating priests being:—

In the early part of this reign a grand military muster was ordered to be made in the county palatine of Lancaster, and towards the 300 men raised in the Hundred of Amounderness the Fylde townships contributed as follows:—

The commanders of the regiment were—Sir Thomas Hesketh, Sir Richard Houghton, George Browne, John Kitchen, Richard Barton, William Westby (of Mowbreck), and William Barton, Esquires.

Dodsworth, who lived in the latter part of the sixteenth and early part of the seventeenth centuries, informs us that sometime during the year 1555 “a sudden irruption of the sea” took place near Rossall grange, and a whole village, called Singleton Thorp, was washed away by the fury of the waves. “The inhabitants were driven out of their ancient home, and erected their tents at a place called Singleton to this day.” It has been surmised that Singleton Thorp was the residence of Thomas de Singleton, who opposed Edward I. in a suit to recover from that king the manors of Singleton, Thornton, and Brughton. The site formerly occupied by the ancient village is now called Singleton Skeer. Dodsworth also declares that the Horse-bank lying off the shores of Lytham was, in 1612, during the reign of James I., a pasture for cattle, and that, in 1601, a village called Waddum Thorp existed between it and the present main-land.

In January, 1559, about two months after the accession of Elizabeth, another muster took place throughout the several counties of the kingdom, and subjoined are enumerated the bodies of soldiers furnished by the different Hundreds of Lancashire:—

An epidemic, described by Hollinworth as a “sore sicknesse,” prevailed in this county during some months of 1565, and carried off many of the inhabitants.

Queen Elizabeth on her accession wrought another change in the national religion, but taking warning from the outcries and disturbances produced by the sudden and sweeping policies of Henry VIII. and Mary, proceeded to affect her purpose in a more deliberate manner. She retained some of her Catholic ministers, taking care, however, to have sufficient of the reformed faith to outvote them when occasion required, and appointed a commission to inquire into the persecutions of the last reign, with orders to liberate from prison all those who had been confined on account of their attachment to Protestant principles. In her own chapel she forbade several Popish practices, and commanded that certain portions of the services should be read in the English tongue. Shortly afterwards a proclamation was issued, ordering that all chantries should conduct their services after the model of her own chapel. This comparative moderation was succeeded at a later period of her sovereignty by sterner measures, and many Catholic recusants were placed in confinement, being subjected to heavy penalties and degradations. During the same reign the military strength of the nation was again ascertained by a general muster. The gathering took place in 1574, when six gentlemen of our neighbourhood were thus rated:—

Cuthbert Clifton, esq., to furnish:—Light horse 1, Plate-coate 1, Pyke 1, Long bows 2, Sheaves of arrows 2, Steel caps 2, Caliver 1, Morion 1.

James Massey, George Alane to furnish:—Plate-coat 1, Long bow 1, Sheaf of arrows 1, Steel cap 1, Caliver 1, Morion 1, Bill 1.

William Hesketh to furnish of good will:—Caliver 1, Morion 1.

William Singleton, John Veale to furnish:—The same as William Hesketh doth.

The whole complement raised in the Hundred of Amounderness consisted of—5 Light horse, 1 Demi-lance, 2 Corslets, 17 Plate-coats, 11 Pykes, 22 Long bows, 22 Sheaves of arrows, 27 Steel caps, 15 Calivers, 20 Morions, and 10 Bills.

Father Edmund Campion, the notorious Jesuit, was apprehended in 1581, immediately after travelling through Lancashire endeavouring to spread the doctrines of his faith, and imprisoned in the Tower. Under the cruel influence of the rack he divulged the names of several persons by whom he had been received and entertained whilst on his journey, and amongst them were Mrs. Allen of Rossall Hall, the widow of Richard Allen, and John Westby of Mowbreck and Burn Halls. Shortly before his execution Campion deplored his compulsory confession in a letter to a friend in these words:—“It grieved me much to have offended the Catholic cause so highly, as to confess the names of some gentlemen and friends in whose houses I have been entertained; yet in this I greatly cherish and comfort myself, that I never discovered any secrets there declared, and that I will not, come rack, come rope.”

The following extracts are taken from some manuscripts in the Harleian collection, and will explain themselves:—

“Names of such as are detected for receiptinge of Priests, Seminaries, etc., in the County of Lancashire.

“The said Brittain remayneth now at the house of Mr. Norrice of the Speke, as appeareth by the deposition of John Osbaldston.

“Diocese of Chester

“Amounderness Deanery

At that period it was customary to levy a tax of live stock and different articles of food on each county, for the supply of the royal larder, and Sir Richard Sherburn, of Carleton and Hambleton, and Alexander Rigby, of Middleton, near Preston,[32] ratified an agreement with the treasurer and controller of Elizabeth’s household, that Lancashire should provide annually forty great oxen, to be delivered alive at her majesty’s pasture at Crestow. Afterwards the sums to be contributed by each Hundred for the purchase of these animals was arranged, and Amounderness rated at £16 10s. 0d. per year. The latter agreement was ratified by Sir Richard Sherburne and Edward Tyldesley, of Myerscough, amongst others. Grievous complaints were made in the Fylde and other parts of the county of the desecration of the Sabbath by “Wakes, fayres, markettes, bayrebaytes, bull baits, Ales, Maygames, Resortinge to Alehouses in tyme of devyne service, pypinge and dauncinge, huntinge and all manner of unlawfull gamynge.” A letter praying that these profanations might be reformed was signed by the magistrates of the several districts, amongst whom were Edmund Fleetwood of Rossall, and R. Sherburne of Carleton, etc., and forwarded to London. A commission of inquiry was appointed, and after an investigation, the commissioners charged all mayors, bailiffs, and constables, as well as other civil officers, churchwardens, etc., to suppress by all lawful means the said disorders of the Sabbath, and to present the offenders at the quarter sessions, that they might be dealt with for the same according to law. They also directed that the minstrels, bearwards, and all such disorderly persons, should be immediately apprehended and brought before the justices of the peace, and punished at their discretion; that the churchwardens should be enjoined to present at the sessions all those that neglected to attend divine service upon the Sabbath day, that they might be indicted and fined in the penalty of twelve pence for every offence; that the number of alehouses should be abridged, that the ale-sellers should utter a full quart of ale for one penny, and none of any less size, and that they should sell no ale or other victuals in time of divine service; that none should sell ale without a license; that the magistrates should be enjoined not to grant any ale-licenses except in public sessions; that they should examine the officers of the commonwealth to learn whether they made due presentment at the quarter sessions of all bastards born or remaining within their several precincts; and that thereupon a strict course should be taken for the due punishment of the reputed parents according to the statute, as also for the convenient keeping and relief of the infants.[33]

In 1588, the year following the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, Philip of Spain, urged on by an ambition to conquer the kingdom of England and re-establish the Romish religion, equipped an immense fleet, consisting of seventy-two galliasses and galleons, forty-seven second-class ships of war, and eleven pinnaces, to which he gave the name of the “Invincible Armada.” The rumour of this invasion spread great alarm throughout the country; and the magistrates, gentry, and freeholders of Lancashire were summoned to meet Lord Strange at Preston, to consider what steps should be taken for the defence of their coast, on which, at Peel in Morecambe Bay, it was deemed probable the Spaniards would attempt a landing. So doubtful does Elizabeth appear to have been of the loyalty of her Lancashire subjects that Lord Strange was commanded to append to his summonses the words,—“Fayle not at your uttermost peril.” Nor were these suspicions on the part of the queen without good reason, for the principal landed proprietors and gentry of the county were members of the Romish Church, and it was to be feared that they would be only lukewarm in repelling, if not, indeed, active in encouraging, an enemy whose professed object was the restoration of their religion. Baines, in reviewing the Reformation, says,—“In the county of Lancashire it was retrograde. The Catholics multiplied, priests were harboured, the book of common prayer and the service of the Church, established by law, were laid aside; many of the churches were shut up, and the cures unsupplied, unless by the ejected Catholics.” Numerous crosses on the highways, as well as the names of several places, as Low-cross, High-cross, Norcross, etc., also testify to the Romish tendency of the inhabitants. Cardinal Allen, who had for many years been living on the continent at Douai and elsewhere[34] was suspected of having, in conjunction with Parsons, the Jesuit, instigated Philip to this invasion. The harbour of “Pille,” (Peel) is described in the Lansdowne manuscripts as the “very best haven for landings with great shyppes in all the west coast of England, called St. George’s Channel,” and further in the same folio we read:—“What the Spanyerd means to do the Lord knows, for all the countrie being known to Doctor Allen, who was born harde by the pyle,” (Rossall Hall was the birth-place of Allen,) “and the inhabytentes ther aboutes all ynfected with the Romish poyson, it is not unlike that his directione will be used for some landinge there.... One Thomas Prestone (a papyshe atheiste) is deputye steward, and commandes the menrede, and lands ther, wch were sometyme appertayning to the Abbeye of Fornes.”

Whilst preparations for resisting the Spaniards were being pushed forward with as much expedition as possible, the “Invincibles” appeared in the English Channel, and arranged themselves for battle in the form of a crescent. The British fleet, numbering only thirty-four ships of war, and sundry private vessels equipped for the occasion, under the command of Lord Howard, sailed out to engage them. A series of actions took place, and although nothing decisive had been effected, the advantage seemed to be leaning towards the English fleet, when eight fire-ships drifted in amongst the Armada and threw them into utter confusion. This coup de maître took place on the 29th of July, 1588. The panic-stricken Spaniards, fearing that the whole of their ships would be destroyed in a general conflagration, severed their cables, and fled. A westerly gale, however, sprang up, and wrecked many of the vessels on the coast between Ostend and Calais; the shores of Scotland and Ireland were also covered with fragments of their ships and bodies of their mariners, while tradition asserts that one of the galleons was stranded on the Point of Rossall, where it was attacked by the country people, either for the sake of pillage or in the hope of capturing it. Whether one or both of these desires actuated the rustics they were doomed to disappointment, for the Spaniards successfully resisted their first attempt, and escaped on the returning tide, before further efforts could be made by the little band on shore. Two cannon balls were formerly to be seen at Rossall Hall, and it was stated that they were the identical ones fired by this vessel, as a parting salute, when she sailed away. They were found on removing some of the walls belonging to the old mansion.

The annexed is a list of free-tenants residing in the Fylde district about the year 1585, the 27th of the reign of Queen Elizabeth:—

• Molyneux, Sir Richard, of Larbrick, knight.
• Clifton, Thomas, of Westby, esq.
• Rigby, Edward, of Layton and Burgh, esq.
• Veale, John, of Mythorp, esq.
• Butler, Henry, of Out-Rawcliffe, esq.
• Parker, William, of Bradkirk, esq.
• Westby, John, of Mowbreck, esq.
• Kirkby, William, of Upper Rawcliffe, esq.
• Singleton, George, of Staining, esq.
• Hesketh, William, of Little Poulton, esq.
• Stanley, Thomas, of Great Eccleston, esq.
• Warren, ⸺, of Plumpton, esq.
• White, Nicholas, of Great Eccleston, gent.
• Rogerly, George, of Lytham, gent.
• Banister, William, of Carleton, gent.
• Sharples, John, of Freckleton, gent.

The dress of the priests previous to the Protestant Reformation is thus described by Harrison:—“They went either in divers colours like plaiers, or in garments of light hew, as yellow, red, greene, etc., with their shoes piked, their haire crisped, and their girdles armed with silver; their shoes, spurs, bridles, etc., buckled with like mettall; their apparell chiefly of silke, and richlie furred, their cappes laced and buttoned with gold; so that to meet a priest in those days, was to beholde a peacocke that spreadeth his taile when he danseth before the henne.” “The manners and customs of the inhabitants of Lancashire,” writes John de Brentford, “are similar to those of the neighbouring counties except that the people eat with two pronged forks[35]; the men are masculine, and in general well made, they ride and hunt the same as in the most southern parts, but not with that grace, owing to the whip being carried in the left hand; the women are most handsome, their eyes brown, black, hazel, blue, or grey; their noses, if not inclined to the aquiline, are mostly of the Grecian form, which gives a most beautiful archness to the countenance, such indeed as is not easy to be described, their fascinating manners have long procured them the name of Lancashire witches.” Leyland in his “Itinerary” says:—“The dress of the men chiefly consists of woollen garments, while the women wear those of silk, linen, or stuff. Their usual colours are those of green, blue, black, and sometimes brown. The military are dressed in red, which is vulgarly called scarlet.” In the time of Henry VIII. the custom of placing chimneys on the tops of the houses was first introduced amongst the English; before that period the smoke usually found its way through an opening in the roof or out of the doorway. The houses of the middle classes were for the most part formed of wood, whilst those of the peasantry were built of wattles plastered over with a thick coating of clay. The few stone mansions existing in Lancashire were the residences of the nobility or of the most opulent gentry. Harrison, referring to the improvements in accommodation gradually gaining ground, remarks:—“There was a great, although not general, amendment of lodging; for our fathers, yea, and we ourselves also, have lien full oft upon straw pallets, on rough mats, onelie covered with a sheet under coverlets made of dagswam or hopparlots, and a good round log under the head instead of a bolster or pillow, which was thought meet onelie for women in childbed; as for servants, if they had anie sheets above them, it was well, for seldome had they anie under their bodies to keep them from the prickly straws that ran oft through the canvas of the pallet, and raised their hardened hides.” Holinshed, also, notices the better style of entertainment at the inns of Lancaster, Preston, etc.; at which he tells us the guests were well provided with “napierie, bedding, and tapisserie,” and each was sure of resting “in cleane sheets wherein no man had been lodged since they came from the laundress.” Camden, writing of our more immediate neighbourhood a little later than the period we are now discussing, says:—“The goodly and fresh complexion of the natives does sufficiently evince the goodness of the county; nay and the cattle too, if you will; for in the oxen, which have huge horns and proportionate bodies, you will find nothing of that perfection wanting that Mago, the Carthagenian, in Columella required. This soil (Amounderness) bears oats pretty well, but is not so good for barley; it makes excellent pasture especially towards the sea, where it is partly Champain; whence a great part of it is called the File, probably for the Field. But being in other places Fenny ’tis reckoned less wholesome. In many places along the coast there are heaps of sand, upon which the natives now and then pour water, till it grows saltish, and then with turf boyl it into white salt.” Several of these salt manufacturies were located near Lytham, and it is very likely that the two brass pans and an ancient measure, discovered about forty years since deeply imbedded in the peat not far from Fox Hall, were used in the production of salt somewhere in that vicinity.

CHAPTER III.
JAMES THE FIRST TO QUEEN VICTORIA.

On the accession of James I., in 1603, the crowns of England and Scotland became legally united, although it was not until a considerable time afterwards that they could be regarded as practically so. This monarch was the first to assume the title of King of Great Britain.

A custom prevailed in former days of relieving the secular portion of the community by imposing exclusive taxes on the clergy, and hence it is seen, that in 1608 a rate was levied upon the latter by the Right Reverend George Lloyd, D.D., the eighth bishop of Chester. The following is a copy of the impost so far as the Hundred of Amounderness was concerned:—

“Archid. Decanatus Cestrie in Com. Lancastrie

A Rayte imposed by me George Bushoppe of Chestʳ upon the Clergie within the Countye of Chesshyre and Lancashyre within the Dyoces of Chest,ʳ By vertue of Ires from the lordes grace of Yorke grounded upon + from the lordes and others of his maᵗᵉˢ most honorable privye counsell for the fyndinge of horses, armes, and other furniture, the XXVIIIth of October 1608.

Amounderness Decanatus Archid. Richm.

George Cestriensis.”[36]

Here it may be mentioned that, although about 636, Honorus, archbishop of Canterbury, attempted to divide the kingdom into parishes, it was not until many years later, in the reign of Henry VIII., that the diocese to which Lancashire belonged was clearly defined. At that date Chester was created a distinct bishopric, and the southern part of our county included in the archdeaconry of Chester, whilst the northern portion was attached to the archdeaconry of Richmond.

In 1617 James I., on his return journey from Scotland to London, was entertained at Myerscough Lodge, near Garstang, by Edward Tyldesley, the grandfather of the gentleman who erected Fox Hall, at Blackpool. Thomas Tyldesley, a cousin of the owner of Myerscough Lodge, and attorney-general of the county of Lancaster, had been knighted by the monarch at Wimbleton in the previous year. From Myerscough the King proceeded to Hoghton Tower, where a petition was presented to him by the agricultural labourers, petty tradesmen, and ordinary servants in this and other districts lying near Preston, praying that the edict of the late queen, whereby sports and games had been prohibited on the Sabbath, might be repealed. The prayer of the petitioners found favour with James, and shortly afterwards he caused it to be proclaimed—“that his majesty’s pleasure was, that the bishops of the diocese should take strict order with all the puritans and precisians within the county of Lancaster, and either constrain them to conform themselves, or to leave the countrie, according to the laws of this kingdom and the canons of the church; and for his good people’s recreation his pleasure was, that after the end of divine service, they be not disturbed, letted, or discouraged from any lawful recreation, such as dancing, either men or women; archery for men, leaping, vaulting, or any such harmless recreation; nor having of May-games, Whitson-ales, and Morice-dances, and the setting up of May-poles, and other sports therewith used; so as the same be had in due and convenient time, without impediment or neglect of divine service; and that women should have leave to carry rushes to the church, for decorating of it according to the old custom; but withal his majesty did here account still as prohibited, all unlawful games to be used on Sundays only, as bear and bull-baitings, interludes, and, at all times, in the meaner sort of people, by law prohibited, bowling.” A few months after this concession to the wishes of a portion of his subjects, James issued a publication designated the “Book of Sports,” in which he explained what were to be considered lawful sports to be indulged in on “Sundays and Festivals.”

The gentlemen enumerated below were free-tenants, residing in the Fylde, during his reign:—

• Clifton, Sir Cuthbert, of Westby, knight.
• Banister, Sir Robert, of Plumpton, knight.
• Fleetwood, Edward, of Rossall, esq.
• Westby, Thomas, of Mowbreck, esq.
• Kirkby, William, of Upper Rawcliffe, esq.
• Veale, Edward, of Whinney Heys, esq.
• Burgh, Richard, of Larbrick, esq.
• Leckonby, John, of Great Eccleston, esq.
• Longworth, Richard, of St. Michael’s, esq.
• Parker, John, of Bradkirk, esq.
• Hesketh, William, of Mains, esq.
• Singleton, Thomas, of Staining, esq.
• Brown, James, of Singleton, gent.
• Leigh, Robert, of Plumpton, gent.
• Smith, John, of Kirkham, gent.
• Sharples, Henry, of Kirkham, gent,
• ffrance, John, of Eccleston, gent.
• Thompson Wm., of Little Eccleston, gent.
• Dobson, William, of Bispham, gent.
• Hornby, Henry, of Bankfield, gent.
• Bradley, James, of Bryning, gent.
• Taylor, James, of Poulton, gent.
• Bamber, Thomas, of Poulton, gent.
• Bailey, Lawrence, of Layton, gent.
• Bonny, Robert, of Kirkham, gent.
• Whiteside, Robt., of Thornton, gent.

In the Registers of Kirkham is the annexed statement, from which it appears that a few years from the death of James I. the Fylde, or at least a considerable tract of it, was visited by some fatal epidemic, but its peculiar nature cannot be ascertained:—“A.D. 1630. This year was a great plague in Kirkham, in which the more part of the people of the town died thereof. It began about the 25th of July and continued vehemently until Martinmas, but was not clear of it before Lent; and divers towns of the parish was infected with it, and many died thereof out of them, as Treales, Newton, Greenall, Estbrick, Thistleton. N.B.—The great mortality was in the year 1631; 304 died that year, and were buried at Kirkham, of whom 193 in the months of August and September”. Charles I. soon after ascending the throne in 1626, provoked a breach with his parliament by endeavouring to enforce subsidies, with which to carry on his foreign wars, and further, he alienated the affections and respect of the Puritan section of his subjects by confirming the regulations of the “Book of Sports.” Dissatisfaction and murmurings were quickly fermented into rebellion, and the closing of the gates of Hull against the king in 1642 initiated those fearful wars, which desolated and disorganised the country for so many years. In 1641, Alexander Rigby,[37] esq., of Layton Hall, Sir Gilbert de Hoghton, with eight other gentlemen, were removed from the commission of the peace, by order of parliament, on suspicion of being favourably disposed towards the royal party. The chief supporters of the king in the ensuing conflicts were the nobility, in great numbers; the higher orders of the gentry, and a considerable portion of their tenantry; all the High-churchmen; and a large majority of the Catholics. The parliamentarian army, on the other hand, was mainly composed of freeholders, traders, manufacturers, Puritans, Presbyterians, and Independents. An engagement near Wigan roused up the people in our vicinity to a sense of the dangers menacing them, and a public meeting of royalists was called at Preston under the presidency of the earl of Derby. Amongst other gentlemen who took a prominent part in the assembly were Thomas Clifton, esq., of Lytham, and Alexander Rigby, esq., of Layton. Several resolutions were adopted, the most important being that a sum of money, amounting to £8,700, should be raised and devoted to the payment of a regiment, consisting of 2,000 foot and 400 horse, in the following scale of remuneration:—

Parliamentary commissioners were sent this year, 1642, into all parts of Lancashire to visit the churches and chapels and to remove therefrom all images, superstitious pictures, and idolatrous relics, which any of them might contain.

Preston and Lancaster were amongst the earliest towns to fall into the hands of the Roundheads, and about ten days after the surrender of the former place, when the people of this district were labouring under the excitement of war on their very frontier, Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall, accompanied by Captain Thomas Singleton, of Staining, and other officers, appeared near Poulton at the head of a number of horsemen, and threw the inhabitants into a state of great consternation and alarm, fortunately proving unnecessary, for the cavalcade had other designs than that of bringing devastation and bloodshed to their own doors, and continued their journey peaceably northward. A few weeks later a Spanish vessel was seen at the entrance of Morecambe Bay, off Rossall Point, and as it evinced no signs of movement, either towards the harbour of Lancaster or out to sea, the yeomen and farm servants of that neighbourhood at once surmised that some sort of an invasive attack was meditated on their coast, nor were these fears in any way allayed by the constant firing of a piece of cannon from the deck of the ship, and it was not until the discharges had been repeated through several days that they realised that distress and not bombardment was intended to be indicated. On boarding the vessel they found that she contained a number of passengers, all of whom, together with the crew, were reduced to a pitiable and enfeebled condition through exposure and scarcity of provisions, for, having lost their way in the heavy weather which prevailed, they had been detained much over the time expected for the voyage, blindly cruising about in the hope of discovering some friendly haven or guide. The craft was piloted round into the mouth of the river Wyre, opposite the Warren, and relief afforded to the sufferers. Rumour of the presence of the ship was not long in reaching the ears of the earl of Derby, who, with promptitude determined to march down and seize it in the king’s name. On the Saturday he arrived at Lytham Hall with a small troop of cavalry, where he sojourned for the night, with the intention of completing his journey and effecting his purpose the following day before the parliamentarians had got word of the matter; but here his calculations were at fault, for the parliamentary leader had already dispatched four companies of infantry, under Major Sparrow, to take possession of the prize, and on the same Saturday evening they took up their quarters at Poulton and Singleton, having arrived by a different route to the earl, who had forded the river at Hesketh Bank. On the Sunday Major Sparrow, who throughout showed a lively horror of risking an encounter with the renowned nobleman, posted scouts with orders to watch the direction taken by the latter, and convey the information without delay to the chief station at Poulton, where the soldiers were in readiness, not for action, as it subsequently turned out, but to put a safe barrier between themselves and the enemy, for no sooner was it ascertained that the earl, “all his company having their swords drawn,” was marching along Layton Hawes towards Rossall, than Sparrow conducted his force across the Wyre, at the Shard, and followed the course of the stream towards its outlet “until he came over against where the shipp lay, being as feared of the earle as the earle was of him.”[38] The earl of Derby advanced along the shore line and across the Warren to the mouth of the river without the naked weapons of his followers being called into service, but finding when he boarded the ship that two parliamentary gentlemen had forestalled his intention by seizing her for the powers they recognized, he unhesitatingly took them prisoners, and set fire to the vessel, whilst Sparrow and his men stood helplessly by, on the opposite side of the water, where the gallant major perhaps congratulated himself on his caution in having avoided a collision with so prompt and vigorous a foe. Some of the Spaniards attached themselves to the train of the earl, whilst others were scattered over the neighbourhood, depending for subsistence upon the charity of the cottagers and farmers, but their final destiny is unknown. The noble general, enraged at the unlooked for frustration of the main object of his journey, determined that it should not be altogether fruitless, and on his return forced admittance into the mansion of the Fleetwoods, at Rossall, and bore off all the arms he could lay hands upon. Resuming his march he re-passed through Lytham, forded the Ribble, and finally made his way to Lathom House, his famous residence.

Inactivity, however temporary, was ill suited to the temperament of the earl, and on receiving the news that the solitary piece of artillery belonging to the luckless Spanish vessel had been appropriated by the parliamentary officials before he appeared upon the scene, and transferred to their stronghold at Lancaster, he conceived the idea of reducing the ancient castle on the Lune, and so taking vengeance on those who had anticipated him in the Wyre affair, as well as removing a formidable obstacle to the success of the royal arms. Before entering on an undertaking of such importance it was necessary that his small body of troops should be materially increased, and after exhausting the districts south of the Ribble, he crossed it, in search of recruits amongst the yeomanry and peasantry of the Fylde. The earl lodged his soldiers in and about Kirkham, and fixed his own quarters at Lytham Hall. Dreadful stories are related by the old historian, from whose work we have already quoted, of the doings of the troops for the short time they remained in the neighbourhood, but it is only fair to state that their rapacity was directed exclusively against the property of those whose sympathies were with their opponents, whose houses and farms they plundered most mercilessly, driving off their horses, and carrying away ornaments, bedding, and everything which could either be turned to immediate use or offered a prospect of future gain. Warrants were issued on the first day of their arrival, from the head quarters at Lytham, over the whole of our section, calling upon every male above sixteen years of age and under sixty, “upon payne of death to appear before his Honor at Kirkham the next morning by eight of the clock, in their best weapons, to attend the King’s service.”[39] The officers to whom fell the task of heralding the mandate over the large area in the brief interval allowed, fulfilled their duties with energy, and a goodly company responded to the arbitrary summons of the commander. After having seen that the fresh levies were as suitably equipped for warfare as means would permit, the earl appointed John Hoole, of Singleton, and John Ambrose, of Wood Plumpton, as captains over them, and gave the order to march. On reaching Lancaster Lord Derby summoned the mayor and burgesses to surrender the town and castle into his hands, to which the chief magistrate replied that the inhabitants had already been deprived of their arms and were unresisting, but that the fortress, now garrisoned by parliamentary troops, was out of his keeping, an answer so far unsatisfactory to the besieger that he set fire to the buildings, about one hundred and seventy of which were destroyed, and inflicted other injury on the place. Colonel Ashton, of Middleton, who had been sent to relieve the castle, arrived too late, when the earl was some distance on his return towards Preston, from which town he dislodged the enemy. A little later the tide of fortune turned against the royalists, and the earl of Derby was one of the earliest to suffer defeat. Colonel Thomas Tyldesley, a staunch partizan of the king, and the father of Edward Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, Blackpool, retreated before Colonel Ashton, from Wigan to Lathom, and afterwards to Liverpool, where he was besieged and forced again to fly by his indefatigable opponent. (Later he distinguished himself at Burton-on-Trent, by the desperate heroism with which he led a cavalry charge over a bridge of thirty-six arches, and for that display of valour as well as his faithful adherence to Charles, he received the honour of knighthood.) Driven from Liverpool, Tyldesley, in company with Lord Molyneux, withdrew the remnant of his regiment towards the Ribble, crossed that stream, and quartered his men in Kirkham, whilst Molyneux occupied the village of Clifton. In these places they rested a night and a day, keeping a vigilant look out for their pursuer, Ashton, from the old windmill, situated at the east end of Kirkham. About one o’clock on the day succeeding the evening of their arrival the soldiers, acting under orders, repaired to their several lodgings to further refresh themselves after their prolonged fatigues, but before four hours had elapsed, a report came from the outpost that the enemy was approaching. An alarm spread through the camp, and with difficulty Lord Molyneux and Colonel Tyldesley assembled their forces in the town of Kirkham, where they elected once more to make a stand against the victorious Ashton. Command was given that all the women and children should confine themselves within doors, and preparations were hurried forward to offer the parliamentarians a vigorous resistance; but as daylight waned and the besiegers were momentarily expected, the courage of the royal troops seems to have oozed away, and they precipitately vacated the town, fording the Wyre, and flying towards Stalmine, whence they continued their retreat to Cockerham, and so on northwards. When Colonel Ashton entered Kirkham he found the enemy gone and the inhabitants in a state of extreme trepidation, but their fears were soon dismissed by the action of the gallant soldier who, on learning the course taken by Tyldesley and Molyneux, pushed on without delay. Ashton followed up the pursuit as far as the boundaries of Lancashire, without overtaking any of the royalists, and then returned to Preston. The rear of his troops diverged from the main road at Garstang, unknown to their leader, and marched into the Fylde for plunder. They passed through St. Michael’s, and visiting the residence and estate of Christopher Parker, of Bradkirk, drove away many of his cattle, and stripped his house of everything of value. In Kirkham they laid the people under heavy toll, and even spared not those who were notoriously well affected towards parliament. At Clifton they found more herds of cattle, which were joined to those already with them; but at Preston they fell to quarrelling over the booty, and it is questionable whether their ill-gotten stores did not prove rather a curse than a blessing to them.

Towards the end of 1643, the year in which the events just narrated occurred, Thurland Castle, the seat of Sir John Girlington, was captured by the parliamentary colonel, Alexander Rigby, of Middleton, near Preston. In the engagement the Lancashire troops were under the command of Alexander Rigby, of Layton, who allowed his small regiment to be surprised and routed by his namesake. After his success at Thurland, Colonel Rigby, of Middleton, proceeded to raise fresh levies in Amounderness. Mr. Clayton, of Fulwood Moor, was appointed to superintend the whole of the recruiting and directed to place himself at the head of the new regiment. Mr. Patteson, of Ribby, and Mr. Wilding, of Kirkham, were each apportioned half of the parish bearing the latter name, in which they were respectively ordered to raise a company. In the parishes of Poulton and Bispham, Mr. Robert Jolly, of Warbreck, Mr. William Hull, of Bispham, Mr. Richard Davis, of Newton, and Mr. Rowland Amon, of Thornton, were made captains, and had similar duties imposed upon them. In Lytham parish, Mr. George Sharples, of Freckleton, received a commission, but was unable to muster more than a very few followers, as the people of that neighbourhood reflected the loyal sentiments of the lord of the manor, and could neither be coerced nor seduced from their allegiance to the king. Captains Richard Smith and George Carter, of Hambleton, raised companies in Stalmine, Hambleton, and the adjacent townships and villages. Mr. William Swarbrick recruited a company in his native parish of St. Michael’s, and Mr. Duddell obtained another in Wood Plumpton.

At the siege of Bolton, in May, 1644, when the town was stormed and surrendered after a valiant resistance, to Prince Rupert, with an army of over nine thousand royalists, Duddell and Davis were amongst the officers slain, whilst their companies were literally cut to pieces. Captain George Sharples, of Freckleton, was taken prisoner, and dragged, almost naked and barefooted, through the miry and blood-stained streets to the spot where Cuthbert, the eldest son of Thomas Clifton, of Lytham, was standing after the carnage, in which he had led a party of the besiegers. Captain Clifton and others near him were in a mood for a somewhat rude and ungenerous entertainment, and placed the hapless Sharples, in his dilapidated attire, in a prominent position and, thrusting a Psalter into his hand, compelled him to sing a Psalm for their delectation. After they had amused themselves in such fashion for some time the prisoner was handed over to the guard, from whom he ultimately made his escape. Captain Cuthbert Clifton was elevated to the rank of colonel as an acknowledgment of his gallant services at Bolton, after which he returned for a few days into the Fylde, where he engaged himself in procuring a fresh detachment of soldiers, who readily flocked to his standard. For their provision and comfort he did not hesitate or scruple to appropriate a number of cattle on Layton Hawes, and to relieve some of the Puritans of Kirkham, Bispham, and Poulton, of their bedding, etc. Having fully supplied his commissariat department by these means, he marched to Liverpool, and joining Prince Rupert, was present at the sacking of that town.

The Civil War had proved most disastrous to Lancashire, where the constant movements and frequent collisions of the contending parties had ruined the towns, destroyed almost all attempts at agriculture, and reduced the inhabitants to a state of wretchedness and poverty, in many instances to the verge of starvation; and notwithstanding the fact that in not one single instance had the Fylde been the scene of an encounter, the people of this section were in as lamentable a condition of penury and suffering as those of the less fortunate districts, a circumstance not to be wondered at when the incessant plunderings are taken into consideration, and when it is remembered that the youth and strength of the neighbourhood were serving as volunteers or recruits, either under the banner of parliament or that of the king. The 12th of September, 1644, was appointed by the Puritans as a day of solemn prayer and fasting throughout the country, and parliament decreed that half of the money collected “in all the churches within the cities of London and Westminster and within the lines of communication,” should be devoted to the relief of the distressed and impoverished in this county.

Sir Thomas Tyldesley accompanied the army of Prince Rupert to York, near to where the sanguinary and famous battle of Marston Moor, in which no less than sixty thousand men were engaged on both sides, was fought on the 2nd of July, 1644. Oliver Cromwell commanded the parliamentarians in person, and after a fierce struggle discomfited the troops of Prince Rupert and drove them in confusion from the field. Sir Thomas Tyldesley retreated with his shattered regiment in hot haste towards Amounderness, where he made diligent search for arms and ammunition, but hearing that the enemy, under Sir John Meldrum, was marching in quest of him he hurried to the banks of the Ribble, and crossed the ford into the Fylde. This latter incident happened towards the end of the week, and on Saturday he was joined in his ambush by the immense royalist force of Colonel Goring, so great indeed that “before the last companies had marched over the bridge at St. Michael’s Church the first company was judged to be at Kirkham.”[40] There is probably some little exaggeration in the quoted statement, but even allowing it to be verbally correct, there can be no doubt that it is unintentionally misleading, as the extreme length of road covered would be due more to the wide intervals between the companies and the straggling manner in which they proceeded than to their actual numerical strength. Nevertheless the detachment, chiefly composed of cavalry, was enormous, and completely inundated the towns and villages in the parishes of Poulton, Kirkham, and Lytham. The men were lodged twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, and even sixty in a house, and on the Sunday morning they set out on an errand of pilfering without respect to persons, pillaging those who were friendly with as much eagerness and apparent satisfaction as others who were inimical to their cause, an impartiality so little appreciated by the inhabitants that they are said to have blessed the Roundheads by comparison with these insatiate freebooters. Horses, money, clothes, sheets, everything that was portable or could be driven, was greedily seized upon, and, in spite of threats and entreaties, remorselessly borne away. Hundreds of households were stripped not only of their ornaments, bedding, etc., but even of the very implements on which the family depended for subsistence. It is in truth no figure of speech to state that by far the larger share of the people were reduced to utter and seemingly hopeless destitution, and grateful indeed were they when their portion of the parliamentary grant of collections in the metropolis, before mentioned, was distributed amongst them, coming like manna from the heavens to comfort their desolated homes. To add insult to injury the graceless troopers compelled their entertainers to employ the Sabbath in winnowing corn in the fields for their chargers, and even refused to allow them to erect the usual curtains to protect the grain from being carried away by the high wind, so that the loss and waste amounted to barely less than the quantity utilised as fodder, and completely exhausted the fruits of their harvest. Sir Thomas Tyldesley, Lord Molyneux, and others of the leaders, fixed their lodgment near the residence of a gentleman named Richard Harrison, and were supplied with necessaries from Mowbreck Hall. Freckleton marsh was the rendezvous, and there the entire forces assembled on the morning of Monday, but were compelled to remain until one o’clock at noon before the Ribble was fordable, when they took their departure, to the intense joy of all those who had trembled for their lives and suffered ruin in their small properties during their brief sojourn. Sir John Meldrum appeared in the district only a few hours after the royalists had left, and thus the Fylde had again a narrow escape of adding one more to the long list of unnatural battles, most truly described as suicidal massacres of the nation, where men ignoring the ties of friendship or kinship imbrued their swords in the blood of each other with a relentless and inhuman savagery, reviving as it seemed the horrid butcheries of the dark ages. Sir John Meldrum hastened in the direction of the retreating foe, but failed to overtake them.

“In 1645,” writes Rushworth, “there remained of unreduced garrisons belonging to the king in Lancashire only Lathom House and Greenhalgh Castle.”[41] This castle was erected about half a mile eastward of Garstang, overlooking the Wyre, by Thomas, the first earl of Derby, in 1490, after the victory of Bosworth Field, as a protection from certain of the outlawed nobles, whose estates in that vicinity had rewarded the services of the earl to Henry VII. The castle was built in a rectangular form almost approaching to a square, with a tower at each angle. The edifice was surrounded and protected by a wide moat. The garrison occupying the small fortress at the date under consideration held out until the death of the governor, when a capitulation was made, and, about 1649, the castle was dismantled. In 1772 Penant spoke of the “poor remains of Greenhalgh Castle.”[42]

The fall of Lathom House and other strongholds of the king and the surrender of Charles himself to the Scotch army of Puritans, brought the contests for a time to a close in 1647, and Sir Thomas Tyldesley, with several more, received instructions to disband the troops under his command. During the foregoing struggles parliament, in order to provide the necessary funds for the increased expenditure, had allowed “delinquents, papists, spies, and intelligencers” to compound for their sequestered estates, and amongst those connected with this locality who had taken advantage of the permission were:—

Presbyterianism became the national, or at least, the state religion, and for the regulation of ecclesiastical matters the Assembly of Divines, at Westminster, suggested that the country should be divided into provinces, whose representatives should hold annual conferences at the larger towns. The county of Lancaster was divided into nine Classical Presbyteries, and the seventh Classis, embracing the parishes of Preston, Kirkham, Garstang, and Poulton, consisted of—

• Mr. Isaac Ambrose, of Preston, minister.
• Mr. Robert Yates, of Preston, minister.
• Mr. Ed. Fleetwood, of Kirkham, minister.
• Mr. Thos. Cranage, of Goosnargh, minister.
• Mr. Chr. Edmondson, of Garstang, minister.
• Mr. John Sumner, of Poulton, minister.

Laymen.

• Alexander Rigby, of Preston, Esq.
• William Langton, Esq.
• Alderman Matt. Addison, of Preston, gent.
• Alderman Wm. Sudall, of Preston, gent.
• Alderman Wm. Cottam, of Preston, gent.
• Edward Downes, of Wesham, gent.
• Edmund Turner, of Goosnargh, yeoman.
• Thomas Nickson, of Plumpton, gent.
• Robt. Crane, of Layton, gent.
• Wm. Latewise, of Catterall, gent.
• Wm. Whitehead, of Garstang, gent.
• Edward Veale, of Layton, Esq.
• Rd. Wilkins, of Kirkham, yeoman.

One of the duties of these Classes was to examine, ordain, and appoint ministers, or presbyters, as they were called, whenever vacancies occurred in the district over which, respectively, they had jurisdiction; subjoined is the certificate given in the case of Cuthbert Harrison, B.A., when selected and appointed presbyter of Singleton chapel:—

“Whereas Cuthbert Harrison, B.A., aged 30 years, hath addressed himself to us, authorised by ordinance of parliament of 22 Aug. 1646, for ordination of ministers, desiring to be ordained a presbyter, being chosen by the inhabitants within the chapelry of Singleton to officiate there; and having been examined by us the ministers of the Seventh Classis, and found sufficiently qualified for the ministerial functions, according to the rules preserved in the said ordinance, and thereupon approved—we have this day solemnly set him apart to the office of presbyter and work of the ministry of the gospel, by laying on of hands by us present, with fasting and prayer, by virtue whereof we declare him to be a lawful and sufficiently authorised minister of Jesus Christ. In testimony whereof we have hereunto put our hands the 27th Nov., 1651.”

(Here follow the signatures.)

In 1648 General Langdale, a royalist officer, appealed to the loyalty of the northern counties to attempt a rescue of the imprisoned monarch from the hands of his enemies. Many rushed to his standard, and the parliamentarians of the Fylde shared the general consternation which pervaded Lancashire at the success of his effort to rekindle the still smouldering embers of civil war. There is no necessity to trace the steps of this ill-judged enterprise to its disastrous issue, but suffice it to say that the defeat and routing of the little army was followed at a very short interval by the execution of Charles I., after a formal trial in which he disclaimed the jurisdiction of the court.

On the 22nd of June, 1650, a meeting of Commissioners under the Great Seal of England was held at Preston—“for inquiring into and certeifying of the certeine numbers and true yearely value of all parsonages and vicariges presentative, of all and every the sp’uall and eccli’call benefices, livings, and donatives within the said countye”; and after examining the good and lawful men of Kirkham and Lytham, it was recommended by the assembly that Goosnargh and Whittingham should be formed into a separate parish on account of their great distance from the church at Kirkham. At this inquiry it was also stated that—“the inhabitants of Newsham desired to be annexed to Woodplumpton; the inhabitants of Clifton and Salwick, together with the inhabitants of Newton-cum-Scales, and the upper end of Treales, desired to be united in one parish. Singleton chappell, newly erected, desired that it might be made a parish. The inhabitants of Weeton-cum-Preese desired that that township might be made a parish, and the inhabitants of Rawcliffe desired to be annexed to it. The townships of Rigby-cum-Wraye, and of Warton, and of Kellamore-cum-Bryning, and Westbye-cum-Plumpton, all humbly desired to be made a parish. The several townships of Eccleston Parva-cum-Labrecke, and the inhabitants of Medlar and Thistleton, and the inhabitants of Rossaker-cum-Wharles, desired to be annexed to Elswick, and that it might be made a parish.” Although at that time these petitions failed in obtaining their objects, much the same thing has been accomplished in more recent years by Lord Blandford’s Act, by which separate parochial districts, as far as ecclesiastical matters are concerned, have been appropriated to each church, thus rendering it independent of the mother-church of the ancient parish in which it might happen to be situated.

In 1651 the son of the unfortunate monarch, who had been proclaimed king by the Scotch under the title of Charles II., crossed the frontier and invaded England with a force of fourteen thousand men. That year the earl of Derby, Sir Thomas Tyldesley, and several other officers, sailed from the Isle of Man, whither they had retired, in obedience to the call of the young prince, and landed either on the Warren, at the mouth of the river Wyre, or at Skippool higher up the stream, with a regiment of two hundred and fifty infantry and sixty cavalry. Two of the vessels grounded during the operation of disembarking the horses, and in the heavy winds that ensued were reduced to total wrecks. As soon as the news of the earl of Derby’s arrival on the banks of the Wyre was rumoured abroad, “all the ships,” says the Perfect Diurnall, “were wafted out of the rivers of Liverpool, and set sail with a fair wind fore Wirewater, where the Frigots rid that brought the Lord Derby over with his company, to surprise them and prevent his Lordship escaping any way by water.” The earl marched through the Fylde, but the martial ardour of the inhabitants was not so readily excited as on former occasions, for the recollection of their abusive and piratical treatment by the troopers of Colonel Goring, in 1644, was still fresh in their minds, and effectually checked any feelings of enthusiasm at seeing the royal banners once again unfurled in their midst. A scattered few, however, there were who were willing to forget the misdeeds of the agents in their eagerness for the success of the cause, and with such meagre additions to his strength the earl hastened on. At Preston he raised six hundred horse, and shortly afterwards encountered the parliamentarians, under Colonel Lilburne, at Wigan-lane, where the royalists were defeated with great slaughter. Sir Thomas Tyldesley was slain, and the gallant earl escaped from the field only to be taken prisoner in Cheshire and suffer the fate of his late regal master, Charles I. Alexander Rigby, the grandson of the Alexander Rigby, of Layton, before mentioned, and only seventeen years of age, also took part in this eventful engagement, and twenty-eight years subsequently, when High Sheriff of the county of Lancaster, erected a monument to the memory of Major-General Sir Thomas Tyldesley near the spot where he fell. So universally esteemed was the valiant knight for his bravery and honourable conduct that the title of “Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche” was conferred upon him alike by friends and enemies. Charles II., after the overthrow of his army by Cromwell, adopted the disguise of a peasant, and having narrowly escaped detection by hiding himself amidst the foliage of an oak tree, fled at the first opportunity over to France. Cromwell was now installed in the chief seat of authority and held the reins of government under the style of Lord Protector.

In 1660, two years after the death of Cromwell, Charles II. was recalled and placed upon the throne; and in 1662 a law was passed by which it was enacted that before St. Bartholomew’s Day of that year, all ministers should arrange their services according to the rules contained in the new book of Common Prayer, under pain of dismissal from their preferments. The following letter was received by the churchwardens of Garstang, ordering the ejectment of the Rev. Isaac Ambrose, who was a member of the family of Ambrose of Ambrose Hall, in Wood Plumpton, from his benefice on account of his refusal to conform to the arbitrary regulation:—

“Whereas in a late act of Parliament for uniformitie, it is enacted that every parson, vicar, curate, lecturer, or other ecclesiasticall person, neglecting or refusing, before the Feast Day of St. Bartholomew, 1662, to declare openly before their respective congregations, his assent and consent to all things contained in the book of common prayer established by the said act, ipso facto, be deposed, and that every person not being in holy orders by episcopall ordination, and every parson, vicar, curate, lecturer, or other ecclesiasticall person, failing in his subscription to a declaration mentioned in the said act to be subscribed before the Feast Day of St. Bartholomew, 1662, shall be utterly disabled, and ipso facto deprived, and his place be void, as if the person so failing be naturally dead. And whereas Isaac Ambrose, late Vicar of Garstang, in the county of Lancaster, hath neglected to declare and subscribe according to the tenor of the said act, I doe therefore declare the church of Garstang to be now void, and doe strictly charge the said Isaac Ambrose, late vicar of the said church, to forbear preaching, lecturing, or officiating in the said church, or elsewhere in the diocese of Chester. And the churchwardens of the said parish of Garstang are hereby required (as by duty they are bound) to secure and preserve the said parish church of Garstang from any invasion or intrusion of the said Isaac Ambrose, disabled and deprived as above said by the said act, and the churchwardens are also required upon sight hereof to show this order to the said Isaac Ambrose, and cause the same to be published next Sunday after in the Parish Church of Garstang, before the congregation, as they will answer the contrary.—Given under my hand this 29th day of August, 1662.

“Geo. Cestriens.

“To the Churchwardens of Garstang, in the County Palatine of Lancaster.”

In this county sixty-seven ministers refused to submit to the mandate, and were removed from their churches by the authority of documents similar to the above, and prohibited from officiating in their priestly capacity anywhere within the diocese. Amongst the number, so interdicted, were the Rev. W. Bullock, of Hambleton, the Rev. Joseph Harrison, of Lund chapel, and the Rev. Nathaniel Baxter, M.A., of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre. The Nonconformists were subsequently subjected to even greater harshness and injustice by an act which decreed that no clergyman, belonging to any of their sects, should reside within five miles of the town or place at which he had last preached, unless he took an oath as under:—

“I do swear that it is not lawful, upon any pretence whatsoever, to take arms against the king, and that I do abhor the traitorous position of taking arms against his authority; against his person; or against those that are commissioned by him, in pursuance of such commissions; and that I will not at any time endeavour any alteration of government either in church or state.”

The sufferings experienced by those ministers who had been deprived of their benefices are described as having been extreme, nay, almost intolerable, and it was doubtless owing to the great severity practised towards the body of Nonconformists that the old creed gained such little popularity for some time after its re-establishment.

Charles II., soon after the restoration of monarchy at his coronation, determined to create a new order of knighthood, to be called the “Royal Oak,” as a reward to some of the more distinguished of his faithful adherents, and amongst the number selected for the honour were Col. Kirkby, of Upper Rawcliffe, Richard Butler, of Out Rawcliffe, and Edward Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, Blackpool.[43] The design was shortly abandoned by the advice of the crown ministers, who foresaw that the necessarily limited distribution of the distinction would give rise to jealousy and animosity amongst those who had been active in the late wars.

In 30 Charles II. a statute was passed entitled “An act for lessening the importation of linen from beyond the seas, and the encouragement of the woollen and paper manufactories of the kingdom”; and by it was provided, under a penalty of £5, half of which was to be distributed to the poor of the parish, that at every interment throughout the country a certificate should be presented to the officiating minister stating that the winding sheet of the deceased person was composed of woollen material and not of linen, as heretofore. The certificate ordered to be used at every burial ran thus:—

“A, of the parish of B, in the county of C, maketh Oath that D, of the parish of B, in the county of C, lately deceased, was not put in, wrapt or wound up or Buried, in any Shirt, Shift, Sheet, or Shroud, made or mingled with Flax, Hemp, Silk, Hair, Gold, or Silver, or other than that which is made of Sheep’s Wool only. Nor in any Coffin lined or faced with any cloth, stuff, or anything whatsoever, made or mingled with Flax, Hemp, Silk, Hair, Gold, or Silver, or any other material but Sheep’s Wool only.

“Dated the ... day of ... in the xxxth year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord, Charles the second, king of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, etc.

“Sealed and Subscribed by us, who were present and witnesses to the Swearing of the above said affidavit

(Signatures of two witnesses.)

“I, ..., esq., one of the King’s Majesties Justices of the Peace for the County above said, do hereby certify that the day and year above said A came before me and made such affidavit as is above specified according to the late Act of Parliament, entitled An Act for burying in Woollen.

(Signature.)”

The foregoing statute was amended two years later, and the modified enactment continued in force for some time, when it was repealed. In the registers of old churches, such as Bispham, Poulton, Kirkham, and St. Michael’s-on-Wyre, where they have been preserved, notices of burials according to this regulation during the two years it was in operation, may be seen; and amongst the records of the Thirty-men, or governing body of Kirkham, is an entry of expenses incurred when they went “to justice Stanley” to obtain his authority to “demand 50s. for Tomlinson’s wife buried in linen,” contrary to the law.

Three years from the accession of James II., his repeated attempts to curtail the civil and religious liberties of his subjects had so far incensed them against him that William, Prince of Orange, was invited over to free them from his rule. In 1688 James abdicated the throne, and the following year William and Mary were crowned at Westminster. Annexed is a list of the gentry residing in the Fylde from the reign of Henry VIII., to their accession, as prepared from original records and private manuscripts:—

• Allen of Rossall Hall.
• Ambrose of Ambrose Hall.
• Bradley of Bryning.
• Bradshaw of Preese and Scales.
• Butler of Rawcliffe Hall.
• Butler of Layton and Hackensall.
• Clifton of Westby.
• Eccleston of Great Eccleston Hall.
• Fleetwood of Plumpton.
• Fleetwood of Rossall Hall.
• Hesketh of Mains Hall.
• Kirkby of Upper Rawcliffe.
• Kirkby of Mowbreck.
• Leigh of Singleton.
• Longworth of St. Michael’s Hall.
• Lowde of Kirkham.
• Massey of Carleton.
• Molyneux of Larbrick Hall.
• Parker of Bradkirk Hall.
• Rigby of Layton Hall.
• Sharples of Freckleton.
• Shuttleworth of Larbrick.
• Singleton of Singleton.
• Singleton of Staining Hall.
• Stanley of Great Eccleston Hall.
• Tyldesley of Fox Hall, Blackpool.
• Veale of Whinney Heys.
• Westby of Rawcliffe.
• Westby of Mowbreack and Burn Halls.

James II., when force of circumstances had driven him into exile, left a considerable number of supporters behind him, chiefly amongst the Roman Catholics, who were not dilatory in devising schemes for his re-establishment. On the 16th of May, 1690, Robert Dodsworth deposed upon oath, before Lord Chief Justice Holt, that the following Popish gentry of the Fylde, amongst others, had entered into a conspiracy to restore James, and that they had received commissions as indicated for the purpose of raising troops to carry out the enterprise:—Colonel Thomas Tyldesley, son of the late Sir Thomas; Captains Ralph Tyldesley, son of the late Sir Thomas; Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, nephew to the two preceding; Richard Butler, of Rawcliffe Hall, and Henry, his eldest son; Thomas Westby, of Mowbreck Hall, and William, his third son, who was designated a lieutenant; and Lieutenant Richard Stanley, of Great Eccleston Hall. Nothing is recorded as to the result of the above information, but in 1694 Sir Thomas Clifton, brother to Cuthbert Clifton, of Lytham, was arraigned, with several more, on a charge of treason in connection with a reported Jacobite plot, but was acquitted, as also were those with him. During the course of the trial, Thomas Patten, of Preston, as witness to the loyalty of Sir Thomas Clifton to the existing government, stated that “in 1689 he received orders from the Lord Lieutenant to secure several Popish gentlemen, and that amongst them Sir Thomas Clifton was one who was taken and brought prisoner to Preston upon the 16th day of June in that year; that Sir Thomas being a very infirm man and unfit to be carried so far as Manchester, which was the place where the rest of the Popish gentlemen then made prisoners were secured, he undertook for Sir Thomas, and prevailed to have him kept at his (Patten’s) own house in Preston, where he continued prisoner, and was not discharged until the January following, at which time all the gentlemen were set at liberty; that during Sir Thomas Clifton’s confinement he expressed to him much zeal and affection to the present government, saying how much the persons of his religion ought to be satisfied with their usage, as putting no difference betwixt them and other subjects save the public exercise of their religion, so long as they themselves would be quiet, and protested for himself that he could never endure to think of practising any change.” Further Mr. Patten affirmed “that he knew Sir Thomas’s disposition to have always been peaceful and quiet.” During the time that James II. was engaged in inciting the Irish nation to espouse his cause and furnish him with an army to invade England and regain his throne, Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, prepared a secret chamber in that mansion for his reception. The disastrous battle of the Boyne, however, in which James was vanquished by William, Prince of Orange, and King of England, crushed all hope of future success in the fallen monarch, and at the earliest opportunity he escaped to France. In 1715, during the reign of George I., his son, the Chevalier de St. George was proclaimed king in Scotland under the title of James III. The earl of Mar and several other influential supporters of the Stuarts assembled a large force and marched southwards; on arriving at the border five hundred of the Highlanders refused to proceed further, but the remainder passed through the northern counties as far as Preston. Here they were besieged by the loyal troops under Generals Carpenter and Wills, who stormed the town and forced the rebels to an unconditional surrender. Many of the leaders were executed, whilst others were incarcerated for various terms; the general treatment of their unfortunate followers may be gleaned from the journal of William Stout, of Lancaster, in which it is written:—“After the rebellion was suppressed about 400 of the rebels were brought to Lancaster Castle, and a regiment of Dragoons was quartered in the town to guard them. The king allowed them each 4d. a day for maintenance, viz., 2d. in bread, 1d. in cheese, and 1d. in small beer. And they laid on straw in stables most of them, and in a month’s time about 100 of them were conveyed to Liverpool to be tried, where they were convicted and near 40 of them hanged at Preston, Garstang, Lancaster, etc.; and about 200 of them continued a year, and about 50 of them died, and the rest were transported to America.” Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, died in 1715, just before the outbreak of the rebellion, but his son Edward, who succeeded him, joined the rebels. For this act of treason he was put on his trial, but escaped conviction and punishment through the favour of the jury, by whom he was acquitted in spite of clear and reliable evidence that he had entered Preston at the head of a company of insurgents with a drawn sword in his hand. After the capitulation, when the king’s troops had entered the town and were marching along the streets, many men from our district, who had congregated on Spiral’s Moss, armed with fowling pieces and implements of husbandry, joined their ranks, and a huge duck-gun belonging to a yeoman named Jolly, from Mythorp, near Blackpool, was instrumental in doing good service to the besiegers by slaying one Mayfield, of the Ashes, Goosnargh. The rebel had secreted himself behind a chimney on one of the houses, and was engaged in picking off the loyal soldiers as they made their way along the thoroughfare below. His murderous fire was at length put an end to by a charge from the famed gun of Jolly, whose keen eye had detected the assassin in his hiding place. Jolly himself appears to have had an aversion to causing the death of a fellow-creature in cold blood, even though a rebel, and the credit of the shot is due to a soldier, whose own weapon failed in reaching the object. The Rev. W. Thornber tells us in his History of Blackpool, that the family of the Jollys, for many years, treasured up the wonderful gun, and that the tale of its exploit was circulated far and wide in the neighbourhood of their home. From the remarks of the Rev.—Patten, who accompanied the army of the Chevalier, as chaplain to General Forster, we learn that those who joined the insurgents in Lancashire were chiefly Papists, and that the members of the High-church party held aloof, much to the disappointment and chagrin of General Forster, who, in his anger, declared “that for the time to come he would never again believe a drunken tory.” Edward Tyldesley, Henry Butler, of Rawcliffe Hall, and his son Richard Butler, were the most distinguished personages amongst the small body of men belonging to this section who openly espoused the cause of the Pretender. The paucity of the recruits attracted by the insurgent standard from our neighbourhood is easily to be accounted for, when it is remembered that for many years the county of Lancashire had enjoyed an immunity from strifes and disturbances, so that the inhabitants of the rural districts, such as the Fylde, had settled down to the cultivation of the soil, and would care little to assist in a work which as far as they were privately concerned, could only terminate in the devastation of their fields, and, probably, in the ruin of many of their households. Especially, in 1715, would the people be disinclined to take part in or encourage insurrectionary and warlike proceedings, for in that year extraordinarily bountiful harvests had rewarded their labours, and general prosperity had taught them the blessings of peace.[44] After the rebellion of 1715 many Papists registered their estates and the respective yearly values thereof, according to an Act of Parliament passed in the reign of George I., and amongst the number may be observed the names of sundry local personages as:—

Prince Charles Edward, the son of the former Pretender, landed in the Hebrides, in 1745, with a well-officered force of two thousand men, and after defeating Sir John Cope, seized the city of Edinburgh and commenced his march southwards. Crossing the border, he passed through Lancashire, and arrived at Preston with an army barely six thousand strong. At Preston he met with an enthusiastic welcome, the church bells were rung, and loud cheers greeted the proclamation of his father, the Chevalier, as king of Great Britain and Ireland. His sojourn in the town was brief, and on the 27th of November the rebel troops set out for Manchester, inspirited by the lively strains of “The King shall have his own again.” Arriving at that city, they continued their march towards Derby, where, on receiving the news that the Duke of Cumberland was at Lichfield on his way to intercept them, Prince Charles Edward hastened to beat a retreat, and on the 12th of December re-passed through the streets of Preston, the wearied feet of his followers keeping time to the doleful but appropriate air of “Hie the Charlie home again.”

The battle on the moor of Culloden, in which the rebel army was defeated by the Duke of Cumberland, finally decided the fate of the House of Stuart, and after experiencing many hardships, Prince Charles Edward escaped across the channel into France. James, the son of Edward Tyldesley who took part in the insurrection of 1715, served in the army of the Young Pretender. During the excitement and alarm produced by these rebellions, silver spoons, tankards, and other household treasures, were deposited for safety in a farm house at Marton; cattle and other farm-stock were driven to Boonley, near Blackpool, whilst money and articles of jewelry were buried in the soil of Hound Hill in that town. The Scots who accompanied Prince Charles were so renowned for their voracious appetites that the householders of the Fylde prepared for their expected visit by laying in an abundant supply of eatables, hoping that a good repast, like a soft answer, would turn away wrath. Mr. Physic, of Poulton, was an exception to the general rule, and having barricaded his house, determined vigorously to resist any attack of the rebels either on his larder or his purse. Hotly pursued by the Duke of Cumberland in their retreat towards Scotland, the insurgents were quickly hurried through the country, but some of the stragglers found their way to Mains Hall, where they were liberally provided with food by Mrs. Hesketh. It is probable that these rebels formed part of the number of Highlanders, who were afterwards captured at Garstang, and that one of them was the bare-footed Scot who seized the boots of John Miller, of Layton, dragging them from his feet with the cool remark—“Hout mon, but I mon tak’ thy brogues.” William Hesketh, of Mains, had considered it prudent to secrete himself on the warren at Rossall until the excitement had subsided, as in some way or other he had been mixed up with the former outbreak, and wished to avoid any suspicion of having been implicated in this one also. At the sanguinary and decisive battle of Culloden, two notorious characters from Layton and Staining were present; one of them, named Leonard Warbreck, served in the capacity of hangman at the executions following the rebellion, whilst the other, James Kirkham, generally known as Black Kirkham, was a gallant soldier, remarkable for his giant-like size and immense strength. The country people near his home were wont to declare that, for a small wager, this warrior carried his horse and accoutrements round the cross at Wigan to the astonishment and admiration of the by-standers. One incident of these times, reflecting little credit on this neighbourhood, but which, as faithful recorders, we are bound to relate, was the journey of Henry Hardicar, of Little Poulton, to London, a distance of two hundred and thirty-three miles, all of which he travelled on foot, solely to gratify a morbid taste by witnessing the legal tragedies performed on Tower Hill. “I saw the lords heided” was his invariable answer to all inquiries as to the wonders he had seen in the metropolis. In this rising, as in the earlier one, the inhabitants of the Fylde evinced their prudence and good sense by remaining as nearly neutral as their allegiance to the reigning monarch would permit them. Those insurgents who found their way into the district were treated with kindness, but no encouragement was given them to prolong their stay, either by professions of sympathy or offers of assistance in their insurrectionary enterprise.

We have at last come to the end of the long chain of wars and disturbances which from the period of the struggles between the Houses of York and Lancaster, had exercised their baneful influence on the territory and population of the Fylde, and are now entering on an era of peace and unbroken prosperity. The small water-side hamlets of Blackpool and Lytham put forth their rival claims to the patronage of the inland residents,—

“And had their claims allow’d.”

In 1788, Mr. Hutton described the former place as consisting of about fifty houses and containing four hundred visitors in the height of the season. This historian also informs us, that the inhabitants were remarkable for their great longevity, and relates the anecdote of a woman who, forming one of a group of sympathising friends around the couch of a dying man, exclaimed—“Poor John! I knew him a clever young fellow four score years ago.” Lytham, also, attracted a considerable number of visitors during the summer, and for many years was a more popular resort than Blackpool. In Mr. Baines’s account of Lytham, published in 1825, we read as follows:—“This is one of the most popular sea-bathing places in the county of Lancashire; and if the company is less fashionable than at Blackpool, it is generally more numerous, and usually very respectable.”

A list of the Catholic Chapels and Chaplains, together with the number of their respective congregations, in the county of Lancaster, was collected in 1819, and subjoined are enumerated those situated in the Hundred of Amounderness:—

In 1836 the first house of Fleetwood was erected, and in a few years the desolate warren at the mouth of the Wyre was converted into a rising and prosperous town. The rapidity of its early growth may be inferred from the following paragraph, extracted from a volume on Lancashire, published during the infancy of this new offspring of the Fylde:—“As a bathing place, it possesses very superior attractions: hot water baths, inns, and habitations of all kinds have sprung as if by magic on one of the most agreeable sites it is possible to imagine, very superior to any other in Lancashire, admitting, as from a central point, excursions by land and water in all directions, amongst some of the most beautiful scenery in the empire. A couple of hours steaming takes the tourist across Morecambe Bay to the Furness capital, and into the heart of a district of surpassing interest. Charming indeed is Fleetwood in the height of the summer, with its cool sands, northern aspect, and delightful prospects. First there is a noble bay in front, an ocean of itself when the tide is in; and when it is out offering firm sands of vast extent, for riding or walking.” Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, bart., of Rossall Hall, lord of the manor, and founder of the town to which he gave his name, was returned on four occasions as one of the parliamentary representatives of Preston:—

MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT FOR PRESTON.

• 1832.—Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, and the Hon. Henry Thos. Stanley.
• 1835.—Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, and the Hon. Henry Thos. Stanley.
• 1837.—Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, and Robert Townley Parker.
• 1841.—Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, Bart., and Sir Geo. Strickland, Bart.

The year 1840 was an auspicious one in the history of the Fylde. On the 25th of July, the Preston and Wyre Railway, running through the heart of this district, was completed and declared open for traffic. By its means the farmer became enabled to convey his produce to the extensive market of Preston; and Kirkham, Poulton, and Garstang were no longer the only towns accessible to our agriculturists for the sale of their crops. The early appreciation of the utility and benefit of the line is apparent from the rapid increase of its traffic, as shown by the annexed tables, in which the official returns of passengers and goods for the week ending Dec. 14th, 1842, and the corresponding weeks of the four succeeding years are stated:—

At the present date, 1876, the average weekly traffic on this railway and its branches to Lytham and Blackpool, amounts in round numbers to £1,200 for passengers, and £800 for goods.

The Preston and Wyre Railway was amongst the earliest formed, and the impression made on the natives of this district, who had been accustomed to the slow-going coaches, must have been one of no little amazement, when, for the first time, they beheld the “iron horse” steaming along the rails at a speed which their past experience of travelling would make them regard as impossible. The following lines were written by a gentleman named Henry Anderton, a resident in the Fylde, on the opening of the railway:

“Some fifty years since and a coach had no power,

To move faster forward than six miles an hour,

Till Sawney McAdam made highways as good,

As paving-stones crushed into little bits could.

The coachee quite proud of his horse-flesh and trip,

Cried, ‘Go it, ye cripples!’ and gave them the whip,

And ten miles an hour, by the help of the thong,

They put forth their mettle and scampered along.

The Present has taken great strides of the Past,

For carriages run without horses at last!

And what is more strange,—yet it’s truth I avow,

Hack-horses themselves have turned passengers now!

These coaches alive go in sixes and twelves,

And once set in motion they travel themselves!

They’ll run thirty miles while I’m cracking this joke,

And need no provisions but pump-milk and coke!

And with their long chimneys they skim o’er the rails,

With two thousand hundred-weight tied to their tails!

While Jarvey in stupid astonishment stands,

Upturning both eyes and uplifting both hands,

‘My nags,’ he exclaims, betwixt laughing and crying,

‘Are good ’uns to go, but yon devils are flying.’”

The fares on the Preston and Wyre Railway at its commencement were:—

Until the opening of the branch lines to Lytham and Blackpool respectively, in 1846, passengers completed their journies from Kirkham and Poulton to those watering places by means of coaches. Three trains ran from the terminus at Fleetwood to Preston on each week-day, and one on Sunday, a similar number returning.

In consequence of the severe distress prevailing throughout the country, a proclamation was issued by Her Majesty for a General Fast to be held on Wednesday, the 24th of March, 1847; and from the public prints of that date it is evident that the occasion was observed with great solemnity in our division—the shops of the different towns were closed during the whole of the day, the streets were quiet, the hotels deserted, whilst the churches were crowded even to overflowing. This distress was caused by an almost complete failure in the potatoe harvests; and at that time these necessary articles of diet were sold at 26s. per load in the local markets, whilst meal, also scarce, rose to 52s. per load.

In September of the same year, the Fylde was honoured by a passing visit from Queen Victoria and the late Prince Consort, who arrived at Fleetwood in the Royal Yacht on their return journey from Scotland to London. An address was presented by Sir P. H. Fleetwood, bart., the Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, Frederick Kemp, esq., James Crombleholme, esq., and Daniel Elletson, esq., on behalf of the inhabitants of Fleetwood, and received by Lord Palmerston, who promised that it should be laid before the Queen. In the course of a few days an acknowledgment was received from the metropolis. In Her Majesty’s book, published in 1868, and entitled “Leaves from our Highland Journal,” these diarian entries relating to the above event appear:—

“Monday, September 20th, 1847.

“We anchored at seven in Fleetwood Harbour; the entrance was extremely narrow and difficult. We were lashed close to the pier, to prevent our being turned by the tide; and when I went on deck there was a great commotion, such running and calling, and pulling of ropes, etc. It was a cheerless evening, blowing hard.”

“Tuesday, September 21st, 1847.

“At ten o’clock we landed, and proceeded by rail to London.”

In 1860, a project was launched for a comprehensive scheme of water supply for the towns of this district; a company was established, and, in the session of 1861, an act of parliament was obtained “for incorporating the Fylde Waterworks Company, and for authorising them to make and maintain waterworks, and to supply water at Kirkham, Lytham, Blackpool, Fleetwood, Poulton, Rossall, Garstang, South-shore, and Bispham, in the county palatine of Lancaster, and to shipping at Fleetwood and Lytham.” The act granted power to take the water from Grizedale Brook, a tributary of the Wyre, which rises in Grizedale Fell, one of the Bleasdale range, and, flowing through the gorge or pass, called Nickey Nook, divides the township of Nether-Wyersdale and Barnacre-with-Bonds, and falls into the Wyre a mile or so before that river reaches Garstang. A dam or embankment, upwards of 20 feet high, 70 feet wide at the base, and 12 feet wide at the top, was raised across the valley, converting the upper portion of it into a reservoir. At the west end of the reservoir, below the embankment, is a culvert, through which the water passes to a guage, where a stipulated quantity is turned into the brook, and the rest enters the pipe for the Fylde. Twelve miles of twelve inch pipes carry the water to the service reservoir at Weeton. The course is down Grizedale, under the railway, through Greenhalgh Green, Bowgrave, leaving Garstang to the right, then past Catterall Mill, through the grounds of Catterall Hall, and onward to the east of St. Michael’s, through Elswick, to Weeton. The service reservoir, situated on the most elevated ground, called Whitprick Hill, in the township of Weeton, has a diameter at the base of 400 feet, and at the top 468 feet. The embankment is at the base 70 feet in diameter, and 12 feet at the top, with a puddle trench in it, varying from 8 feet 8 inches to 6 feet wide. To the south a 10 inch main takes the supply of water for Kirkham and Lytham; and from the west side a main of similar size takes the water for Fleetwood and Blackpool, the supply for the former place branching off near Great Marton, and going by Bispham and Rossall. The Weeton reservoir was formed capable of containing fifteen million gallons of water. An additional pipe, running from Weeton through Singleton, Skippool, and Thornton, to join the Fleetwood main at Flakefleet, near Rossall, was laid in 1875; and a new reservoir, to hold 190,000,000 gallons, is in course of formation at Barnacre, above Grizedale.

CHAPTER IV.
CONDITION, CUSTOMS, AND SUPERSTITIONS OF THE PEOPLE.

There is little to be remarked, because little is known, respecting the social and moral aspects of the untutored race which, in the earliest historic age, sought a domicile or refuge amidst the forests of the Fylde, or invaded its glades in search of prey. The habits of the Setantii were simply those of other savage tribes who depended for their daily sustenance upon their skill and prowess in the chase, and whose intercommunion with the world beyond their own limited domains, was confined to hostile or friendly meetings with equally barbarous races whose frontiers adjoined their own. Certain disinterred roots were necessary adjuncts to their repasts, and indeed, on many occasions, when outwitted by the wild tenants of the woods, formed the sole item. Their Druidical faith and the supreme power of the priesthood over their almost every action, both secular and religious, have already been referred to in an earlier page. The remorseless sacrifice of fellow beings on their unhallowed altars, and the general spirit of cruelty and inhumanity which pervaded all their rites, are not to be regarded as disclosing a naturally callous and brutal disposition on the part of the Setantii, but as indications of the deplorable ignorance in which they existed, and the blind obedience which they yielded to the principles indoctrinated by the Druids. That the Setantii, however submissive to the dictates and requirements of their priests, were far from passively allowing the encroachments of others on their liberties is shown by the promptitude and fierceness with which they combatted the progress of the Roman legions through their territory. No portion of the British conquest cost the conquerors more trouble, time, and bloodshed, than did the land peopled by the hardy and valorous Brigantes with their comparatively small, but equally intrepid, neighbours and allies the Setantii. The two most striking characteristics of the aboriginal Fylde inhabitants were their ignorance and bravery, and whilst the former rivetted the chains which held them in subjection to the priesthood, the latter incited them to oppose to the death the usurpations of the stranger. There is nothing of local interest to recount during the period the Romans held the soil, but after their abdication, when the Anglo-Saxons violated their faith and traitorously seized a land which they had come professedly to protect, the Fylde began to evince symptoms of greater animation; villages sprang up in different spots on the open grounds or clearings in the woods; the solitary Roman settlement at Kirkham was appropriated and renamed by the new arrivals, and, perhaps, for the first time a population of numerical importance was established in the district.

During the earlier part of this era the inhabitants were graziers rather than agriculturists or ploughmen. Three quarters, even, of the entire kingdom were devoted to rearing and feeding cattle, so that the grain produce of the country must have been extremely small when compared with the superabundance of live stock, and as a consequence of such a condition of things, those animals which could forage for themselves and exist upon the wild herbage of the waste lands or the fallen fruits of the trees, as acorns and beech-mast, were to be purchased at prices almost nominal, whilst others which required the cultivated products of the fields, as corn and hay, for their sustenance, were disproportionately dear; thus about the end of the tenth century the values of the former were:—

The latter commanded these comparatively high prices—

Trees were valued not by the circumference or magnitude of their trunks, but by the amount of shelter their branches would afford to the cattle, which seem to have lived almost entirely in the open pastures; and bearing that in mind we are not surprised to read in the Saxon Chronicle of periodical plagues or murrains breaking out amongst them. “In 1054,” says that journal, “there was so great loss of cattle as was not remembered for many winters before.” This, however, is only one extract from frequent entries referring to similar misfortunes in different years, both before and after the date quoted. Swine were kept in immense herds throughout the kingdom, and there is every probability that in a locality like the Fylde, where trees would still abound and provender be plentifully scattered from the oaks and beeches, hogs would be extensively bred. Indeed immediately after the close of the Saxon empire, Roger de Poictou conveyed his newly acquired right to pawnage (swine’s food) in the woods of Poulton, amongst other things, to the monastery of St. Mary, in Lancaster, a circumstance strongly favourable to the existence of swine there in considerable numbers. Kine, also, are usually reported to have been a favourite stock with the breeders of Lancashire, whilst sheep were rare in proportion, although in other places they were exceedingly popular and profitable, chiefly from the sale of their wool.

The Saxon inhabitants of the small villages in the Fylde who were engaged in agriculture had no knowledge of any manure beyond marl, which they mixed with lighter and finer soils; nor were their farm-lands cultivated all at one time, but a portion only of the estate was subjected to the action of the plough, and when its fertility had been thoroughly exhausted, the remainder was tilled and brought into service, the first plot being allowed to lie fallow for a few years until its productive powers had been renewed. Grain was not, as now, purchased from the growers by dealers and stored up in warehouses, but each of the neighbouring people, as soon as the crops had been gathered into the barns, bought whatever quantity he thought would suffice for his household wants until the ensuing harvest, and removed it to his own residence. The universal waste and improvident consumption of grain during this season of abundance, led frequently to famines in other parts of the year, and many instances of that punishment following such prodigality are related in the chronicle before named. One notice, bearing the date 1044, says:—“This year there was very great hunger all over England, and corn so dear as no man ever remembered before; so that a sester of wheat rose to sixty pence and even further.”

The ploughs of our forefathers were, as would naturally be supposed, somewhat rude and clumsy in construction, differing considerably in appearance, although not in their modus operandi, from those which may be seen furrowing the same land in the present day. Each plough was furnished with an iron share, in front of which, attached to the extremity of a beam projecting anteriorly, was a wheel of moderate diameter, its purpose being to relieve the labour of the oxen and to facilitate the guiding of the instrument, especially in turning. The oxen employed were ordinarily four, and yoked to the plough by means of twisted willow bands. Horses were prohibited by law from being used on the land, but there must have been little need, one would imagine, for a legal prohibition in the matter when it is remembered that horses were nearly four times as valuable as oxen, and that the latter were fully efficient at the task. The month of January commenced their season for preparing the ground, and during the period thus occupied the labours of the ploughman began each morning at sunrise, when the oxen were tethered and conducted to the fields, where the duty of the husbandman was lightened by the assistance of a boy, who superintended the cattle, driving or leading them whilst at work. In the inclement months of winter these oxen were fed and tended in sheds under the special care of the ploughman, but during summer they shared a common lot with the other cattle and were turned out to pasture in the fields, being transferred to the charge of the cowherd. Other implements of husbandry in use, in addition to the plough, were scythes, sickles, axes, spades, pruning-hooks, forks, and flails, besides which the farmers possessed carts and waggons of rather a cumbersome pattern. It is doubtful whether the harrow was known here so early, but opinion usually refers its introduction to a later date.

Of the moral tone of our Saxon settlers it is difficult to judge, but that their business transactions were not always governed by a very strict sense of honour is intimated by the following enactment, apparently framed to check repudiations of bargains and, perhaps, to insure fair dealing:—“No one shall buy either what is living or what is dead to the value of four pennies without four witnesses either of the borough or of the village.” William of Malmesbury, who wrote about a century after the Norman Conquest, informs us that “excessive eating and drinking were the common vices of the Saxons, in which they spent whole nights and days without intermission.” It may, however, with much probability be conjectured that not only is the statement in some degree exaggerated, but that its application was designed more particularly for the inhabitants of the larger towns than those of comparatively sparsely populated districts like our own. Nevertheless it cannot be claimed, with any show of reason, that the small section of the nation established in the Fylde was entirely uninfected by the vices which enervated and degraded the wealthier and more populous regions of the kingdom. The evil of intemperance in both food and drink, especially the latter, pervaded the whole community, but as its indulgence required both means and opportunity, its loathsome features were less prominently visible in localities where these were scarce than in others where they abounded. The Church used every effort to awaken a better feeling in the minds of her degenerate sons, and liberate them from the chains of a passion which had so thoroughly enslaved them. Canons were directed against the “sin of drunkenness,” and in order that no plea of ignorance could be urged by any who had overstepped the bounds of sobriety, a curious and minute description of the condition of body and brain which constituted inebriation was appended to one of them, as here quoted:—“This is drunkenness—when the state of the mind is changed, the tongue stammers, the eyes are disturbed, the head is giddy, the belly is swelled, and pain follows.” Ale and mead were the beverages on which these excesses were committed, and cow-horns the drinking cups. It would seem that there was yet another national blemish, that of gambling, which even invaded the cloister and threw its veil of fascination over the clergy themselves, for a canon of the reign of Edgar ordered—“That no priest be a hunter, or fowler, or player at tables, but let him play upon his books, as becometh his calling.”

Water-mills, planted on the banks of streams and consisting of square weather-boarded structures, usually open at the top, were the means possessed during the Saxon era for grinding the cereal products of the Fylde. The wheel which received the pressure of the current, and conveyed its motive power to the simple machinery within the fabric, differed little from those still in use in various parts of the country, one of which until recently was connected with a small mill on the brink of the brook which drains the mere at Marton into the river Wyre, and less than a century ago another mill, situated in the township of Marton and worked on a similar principle, was turned by a stream from the same mere. A water-mill is at present in use near Great Eccleston. After the grinding process had been completed the bran and flour were separated by hand-sieves. About seventy or eighty years after the Normans had settled in the district these primitive sheds were superseded by a fresh species of mill, in which sails supplied the place of the wheel, and another element was called into service. The new erections were of wood, and separated from the ground by a pivot of slight altitude, on which they turned bodily in order to be fixed in the most favourable position for their sails to reap a full harvest of wind. Solitary specimens of this early piece of mechanical ingenuity are still visible hereabouts, but most of the old mills were pulled down about a hundred years ago, or less, and rebuilt with more stable material, whilst the modern improvement of a revolving top only, did away with the necessity for the venerable pivot, and allowed the foundations of the edifices to be more intimately associated with mother earth than formerly.

Throughout the whole of the Saxon dynasty the mass of the inhabitants would be what were termed the “villani,” that is, a class forming a link between abject slavery and perfect independence. They were not bound to any master but to the soil on which they happened to be born, and on no plea were they permitted to leave such localities. To the lord of the manor each of the “villani” gave annually a certain portion of the produce of the ground he tilled, but beyond that they acknowledged no claim to the proceeds of their thrift by the large territorial proprietors. When a manor changed ownership the “villani” were transferred with it in exactly the same condition as before, so that really they seem to have occupied the position of small tenants paying rent in kind, with the important addition that they were forced to pass their lives in the district where they had first seen the light of day. It should be noted that any “villani” not having domiciles of their own were compelled to enter the service of others who were more fortunately situated in that respect.

During the twelfth century the house-wife’s plan of preparing bread for the table, in the absence of public bakehouses, common in some neighbourhoods, was to knead the dough into large flat cakes and lay them on the hearth in full glare of the fire, where they were permitted to remain until thoroughly baked. Bread from pure wheat of the best quality was a luxury unattainable except by those of high station or wealth, the bulk of the people having to content themselves with an inferior quality, brownish in colour and made from rye, oats, and barley. The amount of this indispensable commodity to be sold at a specified price was regulated by law, and the punishments for not supplying the proper measure, or for “lack of size” as it was termed, were—for the first offence, loss of the bread; for the second, imprisonment; and for the third, the pillory or tumbrel.[46] In 1185 the maximum charges to be made for certain provisions were settled by an act which decreed that the highest price for a hen should be ½d., a sheep 5½d., a ram 8d., a hog 1s., an ox 5s. 8d., and a cow 4s. 6d.

In the ensuing century no restrictions were placed upon the tenants of the Fylde as to the course of husbandry to be pursued, but each on renting his farm or parcel of ground cultivated it according to the dictates of his own inclination or experience, the only stipulation being that the soil should suffer no deterioration from any ignorant or imprudent action on the part of the holder. Oats and barley mixed, and a light description of wheat, very inferior to the best grain, were the favourite crops, the former being known as “draget,” and the latter as “siligo.” Arable land was let at 4d. per acre, and the annual yield of each acre sown with wheat, usually amounted to 12 bushels, the value of the grain itself averaging about 4s. 6d. per quarter. Demand notices were sent in two days after the rent had become due, and if not complied with in two weeks the landlord distrained without further ceremony; after an interval of another fortnight, if the money still remained unpaid, the tenant was summarily ejected, and the owner seized both farm and stock.

The meals consumed by the peasantry comprised only two during the twenty-four hours, one, called dinner, being eaten at nine in the morning, and the other, supper, at five in the afternoon. It is very possible, however, that during the summer those farm servants whose arduous duties were entered on at daybreak, partook of some slight repast at an early hour of the morning, but the only meals for which regular times were appointed were the two mentioned. During harvest the diet of the labourers consisted for the most part of herrings, bread, and an allowance of beer, whilst messes of pottage were far from uncommon objects on the rustic boards. Between the year 1314 and 1326 the prices of live stock were again arranged, as under:—

In 1338 no domestic or husbandry servant residing in the Hundred of Amounderness was allowed to pass beyond the boundaries of the Wapentake on profession of going to dwell or serve elsewhere, or of setting out on a pilgrimage, without bearing with him a letter patent stating the reason of his departure and the date of his return. This law, which applied to all Hundreds alike, was intended to prevent the threatened decay of agriculture from a dearth of labourers, who heretofore had been in the habit of deserting their employment and wandering away into other divisions of the country, where they supported an idle and frequently vicious existence by soliciting alms and by petty thefts.

It will scarcely surprise the reader to learn that superstition was rife amongst the populace during the periods so far noticed, and that nothing was too absurd to be accepted as an omen, either of good or evil, by our credulous forefathers. A timid hare encountered in their walks abroad announced the approach of some unforeseen calamity, as also did a blind or lame man, a woman with dishevelled hair, or even a monk; whilst the visions of a wolf crossing the path, St. Martin’s birds flying from left to right, a humpbacked man, or the sound of distant thunder, were welcomed as heralds of prosperity. All amusements were of an athletic kind, and consisted of archery, casting heavy stones, spear darting, wrestling, running, leaping, and sword and buckler playing. On festivals, and occasionally at other seasons, the barbarous and cruel sports of bull and bear-baiting were indulged in,[47] but cock-fighting was considered, until a later epoch, an entertainment only suitable for children, and on Shrove Tuesday each boy took his pet bird to the school-house, which was for that day converted into a cock-pit, superintended by the master.

In 1444, the wages received by different classes of agricultural servants were:—

At harvest time, when special labour was required, the scale of remuneration was:—

The statute which arranged the above rates of payment concluded by saying that “such as deserve less shall take less, and also in places where less is used to be given less shall be given from henceforth;” so that the table just completed would seem to represent the maximum rather than the ordinary scale of wages. This statute also enacted that farm servants who purposed leaving their employers, must engage themselves to other masters and give reasonable warning before leaving their present ones, by which idleness and mendicancy were effectually guarded against.

The common pastimes of the inhabitants during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, in addition to some of those already enumerated which still held their sway, were club, and trap-ball, bowling, prisoners’-bars, hood-man blind, (a game similar to the modern blindman’s-buff, but entered into by adults alone,) battledore and shuttlecock, and during hard frosts skating, at first by means of the shank bone of a sheep fastened on to the sole of the boot and afterwards with iron-shod skates. Hawking and hunting were confined to the families of position who resided at the ancient Halls of the Fylde and to others of similar social standing, forming but a small proportion of the entire population. At Christmas the largest log obtainable was lighted on the hearth and denominated the yule log. If the mass burned throughout the night and the whole of the next day, it was regarded as an omen of good fortune by the members of the household, but if it were consumed or extinguished before that time had expired, it was looked upon as auguring adversely for their prosperity. The first Monday after Twelfth Day was called Plough Monday, a name still familiar to many an old Fylde man, and was observed as a general holiday by the men whose labours were associated with that instrument, who on this day went about the villages from house to house asking for plough-money to spend in ale. Their processions, if such they could be called, consisted of a plough, which was dragged along by a number of sword-dancers; a labourer, dressed to resemble an old woman; and another, who was clothed in skins, and wore the tail of some animal hanging down his back. These two oddly garbed individuals solicited small contributions from the people whilst the remainder were engaged in dancing, and if anyone refused to disburse some trifling sum when requested, they turned up the ground fronting his doorway with the plough. During Christmas week the country people blackened their faces, and thus disguised committed all sorts of frolics and absurdities amongst their neighbours. The chief rustic festival, however, was appointed for the first of May, on which day the May-pole was drawn to the village green by several oxen, whose horns were decorated with bunches of flowers, and accompanied by a joyous band of revellers, who after its erection on the accustomed site held their jubilee of feasting and dancing around it. The pole itself was covered with floral garlands, and streamed with flags and handkerchiefs from its summit. A Lord and Lady, or Queen, of May were elected by a general vote, and to them belonged the honour of presiding over the festivities. The costumes of these pseudo-regal personages were liberally adorned with scarfs and ribbons, so that their appearances should be in unison with the rest of the gay preparations. The morris-dance formed an important feature of the festival, and the performers in that somewhat vigorous exercise wore richly decorated habits on to which small bells, varying in tone, had been fastened. The new year was ushered in with feasting and joviality, whilst friendly interchanges of presents took place amongst all classes. In the evening, a huge wassail-bowl filled with spiced ale was carried to the different houses of the villages, and all who quaffed its exhilarating contents drank prosperity to the coming year, and rewarded the cup-bearers, usually female farm-servants, with some small donation; the following carol in a more antique form, or some similar one, was sung on the occasion:—

“Good Dame, here at your door,

Our Wassel we begin,

We are all maidens poor,

We pray now let us in,

With our Wassel.

“Our Wassel we do fill,

With apples and with spice,

Then grant us your good will

To taste here once or twice

Of our Wassel.

...

“Some bounty from your hands

Our Wassel to maintain.

We’ll buy no house nor lands

With that which we do gain,

With our Wassel.”

On Shrove Tuesday a barbarous custom prevailed of tying cocks to a stake driven into the ground, and throwing at them with sticks, until death ensued from repeated blows. St. Valentine’s day received a merry welcome from the country swains and maidens, who at that auspicious time made choice of, or more properly speaking were mated to, their true loves for the year. The all important selection was made by writing the names of an equal number of each sex on separate slips of paper, and then dividing them into two lots, one of which represented the males and the other the females. The women drew from the male heap, and the men from that of the females, so that each person became possessed of two sweethearts, and the final pairing was really the only element of real choice in the matter; in this the men usually claimed the girl whom each of them had drawn, and thus an amicable settlement was soon arrived at. After the mirthful ceremony had been completed and each happy couple duly united, the men gave treats and dances to their sweethearts, and wore their billets for several days pinned on to their breasts or coat sleeves. Another, and much simpler, plan of choosing a valentine was to look out of the door or window on the eventful morning, and the first person seen was regarded as the special selection of the patron Saint, provided always the individual was of the opposite sex, and unfettered by the silken bonds of Hymen. Whitsun-ales and Easter-ales were assemblies held within, or in the immediate neighbourhood of, the church-yards, at which the beverage, giving the title to these festivities, was sold by the clergy or their assistants, and consumed by the country people, the proceeds being devoted to ecclesiastical purposes and the relief of the poor. Wakes originated in an ancient custom of gathering together on the evening before the birthday of a Saint or the day appointed for the dedication of a church, and passing the night in devotion and prayer. These watches, however, were soon altered in character, and instead of religious exercises employing the period of vigil, feasting and debauchery became the recognized occupations.

The festival of Rush-bearing is of such antiquity that its origin has become in a great measure obscured, but there is a strong probability that the practice arose from a recommendation given by Pope Gregory IV. to Mellitus, who was associated with St. Augustine in christianising the inhabitants of England, to celebrate the anniversaries of the dedications of those places of worship, which they had rescued from Pagan influences, “by building themselves huts of the boughs of trees about such churches, and celebrating the solemnities with religious feastings.” The rush-cart, decorated with flowers and ribbons, was paraded through the village streets, accompanied by morris-dancers and others bearing flags or banners. One of the mummers, dressed in a motley suit, somewhat resembling that of a circus jester, jingled a horse-collar hung with bells, and kept up a constant succession of small jokes at the expense of the bystanders as the procession advanced. In early days before churches were flagged it was the annual custom to strew their floors with rushes on the day of the dedication of the sacred edifice, and in the parish register of Kirkham we find, as follows:—“1604. Rushes to strew the church cost this year 9s. 6d.” From the register at Poulton church we have also extracted an entry, at random, from similar ones occurring each year:—“Aug. 6th, 1784. To Edward Whiteside for rushes, 6s. 8d.” The practice appears to have arisen simply from a desire to promote warmth and comfort within the churches by providing a covering for the bare earth, and its connection with rush-bearing, when it existed, must be regarded as having been purely accidental. Brand has discovered another motive for rush-strewing, more especially in private houses, and one not very flattering to our forefathers:—“As our ancestors,” writes he, “rarely washed their floors, disguises of uncleanliness became very necessary.” Erasmus, also, a Greek Professor at Oxford in the time of Henry VIII., in describing the hovels in which the agricultural labourers and others of the lower classes lived, says:—“The floors are commonly of clay strewed with rushes; under which lies unmolested an ancient collection of beer, grease, fragments, bones, spittle, and everything that is nasty.”

From 1589 to 1590 inclusive, the daily wages, without board, of a ditcher were 4d., a thresher 6d., a hedger 4d., a gardener 10d., and a master-mason 14d. In 1533 it was enacted that no tenant should hold more than two farms at once; and fifty-five years later sundry penalties were imposed upon any one erecting cottages for the agricultural population without attaching four acres of land to each, also for allowing more than one family to occupy a cottage at the same time.[48] A law was passed in 1597, directing that all houses of husbandry which had fallen into decay within a period of seven years should be rebuilt, and from twenty to forty acres of ground apportioned to each.[49] The average yields of grain per acre on well-cultivated soils during the latter half of the sixteenth century were—wheat 20 bushels, barley 32 bushels, and oats 40 bushels. The subjoined tables contain the average prices of some of the common articles of consumption:—

In 1581, the charge for shoeing a horse was 10d., and sometimes 12d. Here it may be noticed, although perhaps rather digressive, that the herb tobacco was introduced into this country sometime during the summer of 1586, by a party of Englishmen, who for a short time colonised the island of Roanoak, near the coast of Virginia, but, having quarrelled with the aborigines, were removed home in the ships of Sir Francis Drake. Camden, writing of these men, says:—“They were the first that I know of that brought into England that Indian plant which they called tabacca and nicotia, or tobacco, which they used against crudities, being taught it by the Indians. Certainly, from that time forward, it began to grow into great request, and to be sold at a high rate; whilst in a short time many men, everywhere, some for wantonness, some for health sake, with insatiable desires and greediness, sucked in the stinking smoke thereof through an earthen pipe, which presently they blew out again at their nostrils; insomuch that tobacco-shops are now as ordinary in most towns as tap-houses and taverns.”

The following rhymes, descriptive of the games and recreations common in Lancashire amongst the youth of both sexes, were written in 1600, by Samuel Rowland:—

“Any they dare challenge for to throw the sledge,

To jump or leap over ditch or hedge;

To wrestle, play at stool-ball, or to run,

To pitch the bar or to shoot off a gun;

To play at loggats, nine-holes, or ten-pins,

To try it out at foot-ball by the shins;

At tick-tacke, seize-noddy, maw, and ruff;

At hot-cockles, leap-frog, or blindman’s buff;

To drink the halper-pots, or deal at the whole can;

To play at chess, or pue, and inkhorn;

To dance the morris, play at barley-brake;

At all exploits a man can think or speak:

At shove-groat, venter-point, or cross and pile;

At ‘beshrew him that’s last at any style’;

At leaping over a Christmas bonfire,

Or at ‘drawing the dame out of the mire’;

At shoot-cock, Gregory, stool-ball, and what-not;

Pick-point, top and scourge, to make him hot.”

Many of these games have long since become obsolete. Tick-tacke resembled backgammon, but was rather more complicated; seize-noddy, maw, and ruff were games of cards, the first being somewhat similar to cribbage, while the two latter have no modern representatives, although the expression to ruff is frequently used at the whist-table; ‘cross and pile’ is merely an earlier name of ‘pitch and toss’; and shoot-cock has been modernised into shuttlecock.

During the seventeenth century occasional village fairs were held in the Fylde, at which such uncouth games as “grinning through a horse-collar,” as well as trials in whistling, etc., were common amusements, while pedlars’ stalls, puppet shows, raffling tables, and drinking booths were well attended by the holidaymakers. At that period any damsel, wishing to learn something, be it ever so little, of her future mate, was directed to run until out of breath on hearing the first notes of the cuckoo, and on removing her shoe she would find a hair of the same colour as that of the husband whom fate had selected for her. On May-day a snail placed upon the ashes of the hearth would trace the initial letter, or letters, of the lover’s name; or the rind, peeled from an apple and thrown backwards over the head, would by its arrangement on falling to the ground effect a similar purpose:—

“Last May-day fair I search’d to find a snail

That might my secret lover’s name reveal:

Upon a gooseberry bush a snail I found,

For always snails near sweetest fruit abound.

I seiz’d the vermin; home I quickly sped,

And on the hearth the milk white embers spread,

Slow crawled the snail, and if I right can spell

In the soft ashes marked a curious L.”[50]

This couplet was recited by young maidens after capturing an insect called a Lady-bird, and on releasing it:—

“Fly, Lady-bird, fly south, east, or west;

Fly where the man is that I love best.”

The following extracts from an “inventarye of all the goods and chattels of Peter Birket, late of Borrands,” taken after his decease in 1661, will furnish a pretty accurate idea of the monetary worth of certain articles of farming stock at that time:—“One outshoote of hay, £1 6s. 8d.; one stack of hay without dores, 10s.; one scaffold of hay, 10s.; one mare and one colt, £3; five geese, 4s.; 13 sheepe, £3; one cock and five hens, 2s.; one calfe, 10s.; two heiffers, £3; one heiffer, £2; one cow, £2 10s.; another cow, £3 10s.” Whether this gentleman was a fair representative of his class or not we are unable to say, but if so, the small farmers of Lancashire, to whom he appears to have belonged, were not over indulgent in articles of dress or comfort, for the whole of his wearing apparel was valued at no more than £1, whilst his bedding realised only 5s.

In 1725 the Lancashire justices arranged and ordered that the rate of wages in all parts of this county should be:—

They also appointed the hours of labour for those hired by the day to be, between the middle of March and the middle of September, from five in the morning until half-past seven in the evening, and during the remainder of the year from sunrise to sunset, resting half-an-hour at breakfast, an hour at dinner, and half-an-hour at “drinking,” as the meal corresponding to our “tea” was termed. “In the summer half,” added the magisterial mandate, “the labourers may sleep each day half-an-hour; else for every hour’s absence to defaulk a penny; and every Saturday afternoon or eve of a holiday, that they cease to work, is to be accounted but half a day.” The day wages, as fixed by the same authorities, were:—

From 1660 to 1690, the average price of mutton was 2d. per pound; from 1706 to 1730, 2½d.; and from 1730 to 1760, 3d. per pound. The prices of beef, veal, and lamb in 1710, were respectively 1⅒d., 2⅗d., and 2⁹⁄₁₀d., per pound.

During the eighteenth and earlier part of the nineteenth centuries there was perhaps no pastime more popular amongst the adult members of all classes than the callous sport of cock-fighting; every village and hamlet in the Fylde had its pit, where mains were held at all times and seasons. The following were the rules pretty generally adopted in this neighbourhood for the regulation of the contests:—

“1.—To begin the main by fighting the lighter pair of cocks which fall in match first, proceeding upwards towards the end, that every lighter pair may fight earlier than those that are heavier.

“2.—In matching, with relation to the battles, after the cocks of the main are weighed, the match bills are to be compared.

“3.—That every pair of equal weight are separated, and fight against others; provided it appears that the main can be enlarged by adding thereto.”

Skippool was one of the favourite resorts for the gentry of our district when wishful to indulge in their favourite amusement, and frequent allusions to the cockpit there are to be found in the journal of Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, as—“June 9, 1714, ... thence to Skipall, where at a cockin I meet with a deal of gentlemen. Gave Ned M⸺y 1s. for his expenses; spent 1s., and won 2s. 6d. of Dr. Hesketh’s cockes.” In 1790 a notice appeared in Liverpool that “The great main of cocks between John Clifton, Esq., of Lytham, and Thomas Townley Parker, Esq., of Cuerden, would be fought on Easter Monday, the 5th of April, and the three following days, at the new cockpit in Cockspur Street—to show forty-one cocks each. Ten guineas each battle, and two hundred guineas the main.” The great-grandfather of the present Lord Derby compelled each of his tenants to maintain a game-cock for his benefit, and many were the birds supplied from the Fylde to uphold his great reputation as a successful cock-fighter.

One of the most ancient punishments amongst our forefathers was that of the Brank or Scolds’ Bridle, a specimen of which was possessed by Kirkham, and doubtless many others existed in the Fylde. This instrument was but little removed in severity from those implements of torture in vogue at the time of the Inquisition, but differed from them in one important particular—it was intended to control or silence, and not to stimulate, the tongue of its victim. The Brank consisted of an iron framework, which was fitted on to the head of the offender, usually some woman whose intemperate language had incensed her husband; and a metal spike, attached to the front of it, was so inserted into the mouth that the slightest movement of the tongue brought that sensitive organ in contact with its sharp edge or point. Doctor Plott, who appears to have held the Brank in high estimation, and to have considered it greatly superior to another mode of correction, much in fashion during his day, says:—“This artifice is much to be preferred to the ducking-stool, which not only endangers the health of the party, but gives liberty of tongue betwixt every dip.”

The Ducking-stool or Cuck-stool consisted of a substantial chair, fastened to the extremity of a long pole, and suspended over a pool of water. The middle of the pole rested on an upright post near the edge of the pond, and was attached to it by means of a pivot-hinge, so that the chair could be swung round to the side to receive its victim, and, after being freighted and restored to its original position, plunged into the water by raising the other end of the shaft as often as those on the bank deemed it necessary to cool the anger of the unfortunate scold. Several pools in different parts of the Fylde still retain their names of Cucking-ponds, and the last person condemned to suffer the barbarous punishment was a young woman at Poulton, but she was happily rescued by the kindly intervention of Madam Hornby, who became surety for her good conduct in future.

In the belfry of Bispham church there formerly stood a plain-looking wooden frame, which in earlier times had done duty as a pennance-stool, but some years since the chair was removed, and probably destroyed, as no trace of its existence has since been discovered. The last to perform pennance in this church and sit upon the stool was a woman, who seems to have been living as recently as 1836. A public pennance was exacted by the Church from all frail maidens, who desired to obtain pardon for the sins into which they had fallen. The ceremony consisted of parading the aisles of the parish church with a candle in each hand, barefooted, and clothed in white. Jane Breckal, of Poulton, was the last to undergo the ceremony at that place, some time during the ministry of the Rev. Thos. Turner, 1770 to 1810. The sobs and cries of the unfortunate girl aroused the indignation of the inhabitants against the pennance, and the cruel and degrading exhibition was never repeated.

Riding Stang was another plan of punishment formerly inflicted on quarrelsome or adulterous persons, and a woman named Idle, of Great Layton, is mentioned as being the last of its victims in that locality, and very likely in the whole of the Fylde. There seem to have been two ways adopted of Riding Stang, one of which was to mount the offending party or parties on a ladder, supported at each end on the shoulders of one or sometimes two men, and carry them about the neighbourhood for several hours, accompanied by a band of men and boys beating tin kettles, frying-pans, etc.; the other mode, and perhaps the more antique one, was to place a youth astride a ladder, borne as in the previous case, and arm him with a hand-bell, so that he was fully equipped to undertake the duties of town crier. A procession was then formed, and, amidst the discordant sounds of the instruments just alluded to, paraded through the streets of the village, whilst the crier, who usually did his part with great gusto, shouted out the following doggrel rhymes, varying some portions of them when occasion required:—

“Ran a dan, ran a dan, dan, dan,

But for ... has been banging his good dame.

He banged her, he banged her, he banged her, indeed,

He banged her, poor woman, before she stood need;

For neither wasting his substance nor spending his brass,

But she was a woman, and he was an ass.

Now, all good people that live in this row,

I would have you take warning, for this is our law,

And if you do your good wives bang,

For you three nights we will ride this stang.

Hurrah! hurrah!”

When the offender happened to be some woman, who had inflicted chastisement on the person of her spouse, the rhyme was altered to suit her sex, and asserted that “he was a coward, and she was an ass.” The remains of stocks in various states of preservation, are still to be seen in many old villages, and their use is of too recent a date to require any elucidation in this volume.

On the fifth Sunday in Lent, Carling Sunday, the villagers prepared a feast, consisting chiefly of peas, first steeped in water, and afterwards fried in butter, which were eaten on the afternoon of that day. Small troops or companies of pace-egg mummers went from house to house in Passion week enacting a short dramatic piece, and afterwards soliciting money, or, in some cases, eggs, from their audience. The dramatis personæ usually represented St. George, the champion of England; a Turk, dressed in national costume; the Doctor, of the quack fraternity; the Fool; and one or two others. In the play, the Turk was wounded by St. George, and being left for dead upon the field, guarded by the Fool, was restored to health and strength by the Doctor, who opportunely arrived, and concluded his self-laudatory harangue over the body of the apparently defunct Turk, thus:—

“Here, Jack, take a little out of my bottle,

And let it run down thy throttle;

If thou be not quite slain,

Rise, Jack, and fight again.”

Easter mumming is now rapidly becoming obsolete, and at present amounts to nothing more entertaining than the recital of a few weak, almost meaningless, rhymes, by, usually, five young boys, decorated with ribbons and coloured paper, and supposed to represent Lord Nelson, a Jack-Tar, a Lovely Youth, Old Toss-pot, and Old Bessy Branbags.

“Lifting at Easter” was an old-established practice, existing in the villages, of hoisting individuals in the air, either in a chair or by any other means that might be convenient, until they purchased their release by payment of a forfeit, generally some small coin. On Ascension-day the parochial schoolmaster conducted his pupils, armed with peeled willow wands, round the limits of the parish, and each pupil struck the various boundary marks with his stick as he passed them. All-Hallows’ E’en was the time when the young people tested the durability of love or friendship by burning nuts:—

“Two hazel nuts I threw into the flame,

And to each nut I gave a sweetheart’s name:

This with the loudest bounce, me sore amazed,

That in a flame of brightest colour blazed;

As blazed the nut, so may thy passion grow,

For ’twas thy nut that did so brightly glow!”[51]

Other pastimes contributed to the evening’s amusement, such as “ducking for apples,” and “snatch apple”—a tub, in the former case, having been nearly filled with water, and the fruit placed in it, each in turn, with hands bound behind them, endeavoured to seize the prize with the teeth; in the latter game, an apple was fastened to one extremity of a rod and a lighted candle to the other, the whole being suspended by a string from the ceiling, and the players, bound as before, snapped at the apple, and avoided the flame as well as they were able.

Until within the last fifty or sixty years, the mosses of Marton and the hills in the vicinity of the Fylde were illuminated with bonfires on All-Hallows’ Eve, or Teanlay-night, as it was called, kindled by the country people with the avowed object of succouring their friends who were lingering in the imaginary regions of a middle state. A field near Poulton received the name of “Purgatory” from the mummery of the “Teanlays” having, on one occasion at least, been celebrated there.[52] This ceremony was simple in its performance, and consisted merely of a circle of men raising masses of blazing straw on high with pitch-forks. On All Souls’ Day our Catholic forefathers were accustomed to bake cakes of oatmeal and aromatic seeds, named Soul-cakes, and these, together with pasties and furmety, formed a feast invariably eaten at that season. Remnants of this custom existed even in late years amongst the youths of Marton and some other townships and villages, who on the day of ancient festival solicited money, under the name of Soul-pence, from their neighbours.

We will now enumerate some of the superstitions and beliefs that have prevailed in the Fylde more recently than those to which allusion has been made in the earlier part of the chapter.

The following adage, showing the signification of certain marks on the nails, will probably be familiar to many of our readers, and it is questionable whether, even yet, it is not regarded by a few of the less enlightened of the peasantry as something more than a mere saying:—

“Specks on the fingers,

Fortune often lingers;

Specks on the thumbs,

Fortune surely comes.”

No sick person could die if the bed or pillow upon which he lay contained a pigeon’s feather; and, at an earlier date, the dwellers near the coast firmly believed that life could only depart with the ebbing tide. A horse-shoe nailed against the stable or barn-door, or a broom-stick placed across the threshold of the dwelling, prevented the entrance of witches or evil persons; also a hot heater placed in the churn, and the mark of a cross, protected respectively the cream and baking of dough from their presence. The advent of guests was made known to the family circle by certain conditions of the fire-grate; thus, a flake of soot hanging from the topmost bar foretold a boy visitor, from the second a man, from the third a woman, and from the fourth a girl. Cats were popularly supposed to have the power of drawing the breath, and as a natural consequence the life, out of children when asleep, and for this reason great care was taken to exclude them from bedchambers. Should a dark complexioned person be the first to enter a dwelling on New Year’s morning, the household looked forward with confidence to a prosperous year; but if the person happened to be light, more especially if he had red hair, the omen was regarded as unpropitious. Moon-beams shining through the windows of bedrooms were considered injurious to the sleepers, and even capable of distorting their features, or rendering them imbecile. Children were taught to recite these simple lines whenever the moon shone into their chambers:—

“I see the moon,

The moon sees me;

God bless the priest

That christened me.”

A tooth, after extraction, was sprinkled with salt and thrown into the fire in order to insure peace and comfort to the person from whose mouth it had been removed. A pair of shoes placed under the bed so that the tips of the toes alone were visible, formed a certain remedy for cramp. Warts were removed by rubbing them with a piece of stolen beef, which was afterwards carefully and secretly buried to render the charm complete; a snail hung on to a thorn was equally efficacious in removing these excrescences, which gradually faded away as the snail itself melted and vanished. A bag, containing small stones of the same number as the warts, thrown over the left shoulder, transmitted them to the person who had the misfortune to pick up the pebbles. People labouring under attacks of ague, jaundice, or other ailments, applied for relief to the wise-men of the neighbourhood, who professed to cure them by incantations. The two following receipts are taken from an old medical work, published as early as 1612, and in its time a highly popular authority on matters of “Phisicke and Chirurgerie” amongst our rural populations:—

“A good Medicine to staunch the bleeding of the Nose, although it bleed never so freely.

“Take an egg and breake it on the top, in such sorte that all the white and yolke may issue cleane forthe of it; then fill the egg-shell with some of the bloud of the party which bleedeth, and put it in the fire, and there let it remaine until it be harde, and then burne it to ashes, and it will staunch the bleeding immediately without all doubt.”

“A very good Medicine to staunch bloud when nothing else will do it, by reason the veine is cut, or that the wound is greate.

“Take a Toade and dry him very well in the sunne, and then put him in a linen Bagge, and hang him about the necke of him that bleedeth with a stringe, and let it hange so low that it may touch his breaste on the left side neere unto his hart, and commonly this will stay all manner of bleeding at the mouth, nose, wound, or otherwise whatever. Probatum est.”

A woman named Bamber, living at Marton, attained to considerable celebrity amongst the peasantry and others by her skill in checking bleeding, which she is reported to have accomplished by the utterance of some mystic words.

The people of the Fylde were not exempt from the common belief in the miraculous power of the Royal touch in that particular form of disease known as king’s evil, for amongst the records of the Thirty-men of Kirkham is a notice that in 1632 a sum of money was “given to Ricd. Barnes’s child, that had the king’s evil, to help him up to London,” to be touched by Charles I.

The fairies of the Fylde were supposed, like those of other localities, to reside in the earth; the vicinity of a cold spring, situated between Hardhorn and Newton, was one of their legendary resorts, and from such reputation acquired the name of “Fairies’ well.” Many stories are told of the mischievous, or good-natured doings of these imaginary beings; one or two of which we will here narrate:—A poor woman when filling her pitcher at the above well, in order to bathe the weak eyes of her infant, was gently addressed by a handsome man, who gave her a small box of ointment, and told her at the same time that it would prove an infallible remedy for the ailment of her child. The woman, although grateful for the present, either overcome by that irresistible curiosity which is commonly, but perhaps erroneously, supposed to attach itself to her sex, or doubtful of the efficacy which the stranger had assigned to the drug, applied it to one of her own eyes. A few days afterwards she had occasion to go to Preston, and whilst there detected her benefactor in the act of stealing corn from the open mouths of some sacks exposed for sale, and, having accosted him, began to remonstrate with him on the wickedness of his proceedings, when he inquired with evident surprise, how she became enabled to observe him, as he was invisible to all else. She explained the use that had been made of his ointment, and pointed to the powerful eye; but hardly had the words been uttered and the organ of supernatural vision indicated, before he raised his clenched hand, and with one blow struck out the offending optic, or rather reduced it to a state of total and irrecoverable blindness. Another anecdote refers to a milkmaid, who, whilst engaged in her avocation, perceived a jug and sixpence placed near to her by some invisible means; but no way disconcerted by the singular event, and probably attributing it to the agency of one of the elvan tribes, she filled the pitcher with milk, and, having watched its mysterious disappearance and, with unerring commercial instinct, pocketed the silver coin, took her departure. This episode was repeated for many successive mornings, until the maiden, overjoyed at her good fortune, revealed the curious adventures to her lover, and from that hour the hobgoblins appear either to have grown less thirsty, or, annoyed at what they might consider the betrayal of their secret, to have removed their custom to some other dairy, for neither jug nor sixpence ever gladdened the morning labours of the milkmaid again. A ploughman had his good nature, in cheerfully repairing the broken “spittle” of a lady liberally rewarded. The fairy, for such she proved to be, made known her presence to the agriculturist by suddenly crying in a distressed tone—“I have broken my speet,” and then held out in her hands the useless instrument with a hammer and nails. No sooner had she received her property, restored to a state of utility, than she vanished into the earth, but not, however, without leaving a substantial acknowledgment of his skill and kindness in the palm of the astonished husbandman.

We can only discover a record of one witch in the Fylde; this person of unenviable notoriety is stated to have had her abode in Singleton, and to have been known to the villagers as Mag Shelton. Her food, according to local tradition, was composed of boiled groats mixed with thyme or parsley, and numerous are the anecdotes related of her evil machinations and doings in the neighbourhood—the cows of the country people were constantly milked by her, whilst the pitcher walked before her in the form of a goose; lives were blighted and prosperity checked by the influence of her evil eye. Once, however, she was foiled by a girl, who fastened her to a chair by sticking a bodkin, crossed with two weavers’ healds, about her dress when seated before a large fire.

Some idea of the spiritual condition of the peasantry may be obtained from the perusal of the following prayer, a common one amongst the children of the Fylde about one hundred years ago:—

“Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,

Bless the bed that I lie on;

There are four corners to my bed,

And four angels overspread,

Two at the feet and two at the head.

If any ill thing me betide,

Beneath your wings my body hide.

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,

Bless the bed that I lie on.”

Bacon was considered to prove the finest and best if the hogs were slaughtered before the moon began to wane, and in some month whose name contained the letter R:—

“Unless your bacon you would mar

Kill not your pig without the R.”

The dumb-cake was made by unmarried women who wished to divine the selection of fate as to their future husbands. The cake was baked in strict silence by two maidens on Midsummer’s eve, and afterwards broken into three pieces by another, who placed one under each of their pillows; during sleep the expectant fair ones were rewarded with a vision of their lovers, but the charm was ruined if only a single word were spoken. Hemp-seed, also, was sown by young maidens, who whilst scattering it recited the words “Hemp-seed I sow, hemp-seed I hoe, and he that is my true-love come after me and mow.” After repeating the rhyme three times it was only necessary to look over the shoulder, and the apparition of the destined swain would never fail to appear:—

“At eve last Midsummer no sleep I sought,

But to the field a bag of hemp-seed brought;

I scattered round the seed on every side,

And three times, in a trembling accent cried:

‘This hemp-seed with my virgin hand I sow,

Who shall my true love be the crop shall mow.’

I straight looked back, and, if my eyes speak truth,

With his keen scythe behind me came a youth.”[53]

A spinster who fasted on Midsummer’s eve, and at midnight laid a clean cloth, with bread, cheese, and ale, and sat down to the table as though about to eat, would be gratified with a sight of the person to whom she would be married. This individual was supposed to pass through the doorway, left open for the purpose, as the clock struck twelve, and, approaching the table, to salute his future partner with a bow and a pretence of drinking her health, after which he vanished, and the maid retired to her couch to rejoice or mourn, according as she admired or contemned the prospect in store for her. Cuttings or combings from the hair were thrown into the fire, and upon their blazing brightly or smouldering away depended the duration of life likely to be enjoyed by the person from whose head they had been taken. Wishing-wells and gates were visited by credulous rustics, who were anxious to make use of their mysterious power in obtaining their desires in matters of love or business. The forefinger was deemed venomous, and on that account children were instructed not to spread salve or ointment with it.

About a century ago oats formed the chief production, and nearly, if indeed not quite, the only grain crop cultivated in the Fylde. When reaped, in harvest time, this commodity was carried on the backs of pack-horses to the markets of Poulton, Kirkham, Garstang, and Preston. The “horse bridge” between Carleton and Poulton was originally a narrow structure, capable only of affording passage to a single horse at once, and it was from the practice of the farmers, with their laden cattle, crossing the stream by its aid, when journeying to market, that the bridge derived its name. These horses followed a leader ornamented with a bell, and after they had arrived at their destination and been relieved of their burdens, returned home in the same order without a driver, leaving him to attend to his duties at the market. The old bridge in use at the period to which we allude, still exists, but is built over and hidden by the present erection. Later experience has taught the agriculturist that the soil of the Fylde is capable of producing, under proper tillage, other crops, equal in their abundance to the one to which it appears formerly to have been mainly devoted, and it would be difficult at the present day to enumerate with accuracy the many and varied fruits of the earth that have found a home in the Corn-field of Amounderness.

We mentioned about the commencement of the chapter that marl was in general use as a manure in the Anglo-Saxon era, and here it is perhaps hardly necessary to state that this substance, so rich in lime and so adapted for giving consistency to the sandy soils, is still occasionally had recourse to by the husbandman. Guano was first introduced into this country about the year 1842, but it is probable that it was not commonly used in our district until the beginning of 1845, when a cargo was imported from Ichaboe to Fleetwood by Messrs. Kemp and Co., and offered for sale to the farmers of the neighbourhood. Other cargoes followed. Subjoined are arranged some tables showing the average market values of certain productions of the Fylde in the two years given:—

CHAPTER V.
COSTUMES, COUNTRY, RIVERS, AND SEA.

The history of the dresses and costumes of the inhabitants of the Fylde is interesting not only on account of the multifarious changes and peculiarities which it exhibits, but also as a sure indication of the progress in civilisation, wealth, and taste, made in our section at different eras. To Julius Cæsar we are indebted for our earliest knowledge of the scanty dress worn by the aborigines of this district, and from that warrior it is learnt that a slight covering of roughly prepared skins, girded about the loins, and the liberal application of a blue dye, called woad, to the rest of the body constituted the sole requisites of their primitive toilets. Cæsar conjectures that the juice or dye of woad was employed by the people to give them a terror-striking aspect in battle, but here he seems to have fallen into error, for the wars engaged in by the Setantii would be confined to hostilities with neighbouring tribes, stained in a similar manner, and it is scarcely reasonable to suppose that either side would hope to intimidate the other by the use of a practice common to both. A more probable explanation of the custom is, that it was instituted for the ornamental qualities it possessed in the eyes of the natives. Such a view is supported by the remarks of Solinus, a Roman author, who informs us that the embellishments usually consisted of the figures of animals, “which grew with the growth of the body”; and from this it is evident that before the frame had arrived at maturity, in either youth or childhood, the skin was subjected to the painful and laborious process of tattooing, for such according to Isidore, appears to have been the nature of the operation. The latter asserts that the staining was accomplished by squeezing out the juice of the plant on to the skin, and puncturing it in with sharp needles. When the Romans established a station at Kirkham, and opened out the Fylde by means of a good road-way to the coast, the Setantii modified their wild uncultivated habits, and, taking pattern from the more civilised garb of their conquerors, adopted a covering for the lower limbs, called brachæ, hence the modern breeches, whilst many of the chiefs were not long before they strutted about in all the pride of a toga, or gown. About four hundred years later, when the Anglo-Saxons had taken possession of the soil of the Fylde, and had either appropriated the deserted settlements and renamed them, or reared small and scattered groups of dwellings of their own, a marked change became visible in the nationality, character, and costumes of the people. No longer the semi-civilised and half-clad Briton was lord of the domain, but the more refined Saxon with his linen shirt, drawers, and stockings, either of linen or woollen, and bandaged crosswise from the ankle to the knee with strips of leather; over these a tunic of the same material as the stockings was thrown, and reached as low as the knees, being plain or ornamented according to the means or rank of the wearer. This garment was open at the neck and for a short distance over the chest; the sleeves, extending to the wrists, were generally tight, and a girdle frequently, but not universally, confined the gown round the waist. In addition a small cloak was worn for out-door purposes over the tunic, and fastened on the breast or shoulder with brooches or clasps. The shoes of the Saxon settlers were open down the instep, where they were laced or tied with two thongs. Even the very lowest of the population, although poverty might reduce them to miserable straits, seldom, if ever, went barefooted. Caps, on the contrary, were not in great request, and rarely to be seen, unless on the heads of some of the more affluent. Our female ancestors at that era were habited in a close-fitting dress, falling to the feet and furnished with tight sleeves, reaching as far as the wrists, over which was placed a shorter gown with loose open sleeves. Their head-dress was simply a strip of linen of sufficient length to wrap round the temples and fall on the neck. Amongst the wealthiest of the nation a flowing mantle, ornaments of precious metal, and sable, beaver, and fox furs were common, but the inhabitants of the Fylde, being of less exalted social standing, were obliged to content themselves with the skins of lambs and cats by way of adornment. The inferior farm servants, called serfs, amongst whom many of the vanquished Britons would be classed, were seldom indulged by their masters with more than a coat, a pair of drawers, and sandals, the shirt, we presume, being deemed ill suited to their positions of servitude and dependence.

The colonisation of the Danes, whatever effect it may have had upon the habits and condition of the people, exercised no lasting influence upon their dress, and it was not until half a century after the Norman baron, Roger de Poictou, had parcelled out the land amongst his tenants, that the bulk of the males were induced, by the example of the new-comers, to display their taste in the choice of a head-covering. Many varieties were daily open to their inspection on the brows of the Norman landholders and servants, but the diffidence, let us hope, of the now humbled Saxons suggested the adoption of an exceedingly plain flat species of bonnet, which speedily became the common cap of the district. The ladies, however, with a greater aptitude for rising superior to disappointment and affliction, were not dilatory in benefitting by the superior style of the fair partners of their conquerors, and soon, putting aside all semblance of depression, appeared in long cuffs, hanging to the ground from their upper dress sleeves and tied in a large knot; their kerchiefs, also, whose modest proportions had formerly served only to encircle the forehead, were now extravagantly lengthened and fastened in a similar manner. As years rolled on and fashion began to assert her sway with a greater show of authority, the shoes of the men underwent certain changes, becoming more neat in workmanship and having the toes somewhat elongated and pointed, whilst the richer of the gentry, chiefly Normans, wore short boots reaching a little distance up the calf. In the early part of the thirteenth century the female head-dresses consisted of nets, made from various materials, in which the hair was confined; and the trains of the gowns were lengthened. Later in the same era cowls or hoods, twisted and pinned in fanciful shapes, adorned the heads of the ladies, and formed the main feature of their walking costumes. Aprons also came up at that period. The dress of the men underwent no alteration of any moment until the first half of the fourteenth century, when the manorial lords of the neighbourhood, and others of the inhabitants, discarded the cloaks and tunics of their forefathers, and substituted in their stead a close-fitting outer garment of costly and handsome material, scarcely covering the hips, immediately above which it was surrounded by a girdle. The sleeves usually terminated at the elbows, and from there long white streamers depended, whilst the sleeves of an under dress reached to the wrists, and were ornamented with rows of buttons. A long cape and cowl was the general overcoat. The most characteristic dress of the ladies was a habit cut away at the sides so as to expose the under skirt, which was invariably of rich and fine texture. The long white streamers, just alluded to, were part of the female as well as the male attire, and the borders of the habit were bound with fur or velvet. We may mention that an English beau of that era wore long pointed shoes, the toes of which were connected with the knees by gold or silver chains, a long stocking of different colour on each leg, short trowsers, barely extending to the middle of the thigh, a coat, half of which was white and the other blue or some equally bright colour, and a silken hood or bonnet, fastened under the chin, embroidered with grotesque figures of animals, and occasionally decked with gold and precious stones. Lest, however, the reputations of our ancestors should suffer in the eyes of the present generation from the existence in their age of the absurdity here pictured, it is our duty and pleasure to assure all readers that such parodies on manhood were strictly confined to the populous cities, and that there is no probability of even a solitary specimen ever having desecrated the modest soil of the Fylde.

During the greater portion of the succeeding cycle of a hundred years a species of cloth turban was much in favour amongst the male sex of the middle and upper classes, from one side of which a length of the same material hung down below the waist, and was either thrust between the girdle and the coat, or wrapped round the neck as a protection from cold. Faces were cleanly shaved, and hair cut as close to the scalp as possible; hitherto, from about the date of the first arrival of the Normans, the practice had been to allow the latter to grow long and to wear the beard. The hose were long and tight. The boots were either short, or reached half-way up the thighs, both kinds being long toed. Occasionally a single feather relieved the plainness of the turban-shaped cap. The ordinary dress of the gentlewomen was a full trained robe or gown, made high in the neck, and sometimes, with a fur or velvet turn-over collar, its folds at the short-waist being confined by means of a simple band and buckle. Coiffures were mostly heart-shaped, but in some rare instances horned. The sleeves of the above costume were, shortly after its institution, lengthened and widened to a ridiculous extent. Towards the end of the particular era of which we are writing trains were discontinued, and broad borders of fur substituted, whilst round tapering hats, two feet in height, with loose kerchiefs floating from the apex, came much into favour. The last few years of the fifteenth and the earliest ones of the sixteenth centuries were marked by great changes in the male attire; the Butlers, Cliftons, Carletons, Westbys, Allens, Molyneux, and many others of the gentry of the neighbourhood, figured at that period in fine shirts of long lawn, embroidered with silk round the collar and wristbands, a doublet with sleeves open at the elbows to allow the shirt to protrude, a stomacher, over which the doublet was laced; a long gown or cloak, with loose or hanging sleeves and broad turn-over collar of fur or velvet; long hose or stockings; broad-toed shoes for ordinary use, and high boots, reaching to the knees, for riding purposes; and broad felt hats, or variously shaped caps of fur or velvet, adorned with ostrich or other feathers. The hair was permitted to grow enormously long and fall down the back and over the shoulders, but the face was still cleanly shaved, with the exception of military and aged persons, who wore mustaches or beards. The wives and daughters, belonging to such families as those alluded to, were habited in upper garments, cut square at the neck, and stomachers, belts, and buckles, or costly girdles with long pendants in front. The sleeves were slit at the elbows in a manner similar to those of the men. High head-dresses were abandoned, and a cap or caul of gold net or embroidery, which allowed the hair to flow beneath it half way to the ground, took their place. Turbans, also, were fashionable for a brief season. The females of a humbler sphere wore plain grey cloth gowns, ornamented with lambs’ skin or wool, and cloaks of Lincoln green; the appearance of such an one upon a holiday is described by Skelton, the laureate of Henry VII., as under:—

“Her kirtle bristow red,

With cloths upon her head,

They weigh a ton of lead.

She hobbles as she goes,

With her blanket hose,

Her shoone smeared with tallow.”

In the following reign, the commonalty, in imitation of the example set by the resident squires in this and other parts of the kingdom, became so extravagant in their ideas of suitable habiliments that Henry VIII. issued an edict, prohibiting them from wearing ornaments of even the most simple description, and confining them to the use of cloth at a certain fixed price, and lambs’ fur only. At the same time, velvets of any colour, furs of martens, chains, bracelets, and collars of gold were allowed only to those who possessed an income of not less than two hundred marks per annum; but the sons and heirs of such were permitted to wear black velvet or damask, and tawny-coloured russet or camlet. None but those in the yearly receipt of one hundred marks could venture on satin or damask robes. The dress which may be taken as the most characteristic garb under the sovereignty of the last Henry and of his two immediate successors, comprised a doublet with long bases, or skirts, and extensive sleeves, over which was thrown a short cloak, provided with armholes for the passage of the doublet sleeves. The cloak had a wide rolling collar, made of velvet, fur, or satin, according to taste. The shirt was plaited, and embroidered with gold, silver, or silk. The hose were closely fitted to the limb, being in some cases long and entire, and in others divided, under the names of the upper and nether stocks. Slashed shoes, or buskins of velvet and satin, with broad toes, and a cap of one of sundry forms, either simply bordered, or laden with feathers, completed the costume of every male member of the numerous families inhabiting the ancient halls of this section. Sir Walter Scott, who is generally allowed to have been pretty correct in the costumes of his heroes and minor characters, has described the appearance of a yeoman of our county about the middle of the sixteenth century as follows:—

“He was an English yeoman good,

And born in Lancashire.

...

His coal-black hair, shorn round and close,

Set off his sun-burnt face;

Old England’s sign, St. George’s cross,

His barret-cap did grace;

His bugle horn hung from his side,

All in a wolf-skin baldric tied;

And his short falchion, sharp and clear,

Had pierced the throat of many a deer.

His kirtle, made of forest green,

Reached scantly to his knee;

And at his belt, of arrows keen

A furbished sheaf bore he.”

Shortly after the accession of Queen Elizabeth in 1558, remarkable alterations became evident in the fashions of the inhabitants. The skirts of the doublet were reduced to much smaller dimensions, so as thoroughly to expose the upper stocks, which, under the new title of trunk-hose, had risen to a very important place in the toilet. French trunk-hose were the first to render themselves conspicuous in our locality, and consisted of two varieties, the former of which were short, round, and full, becoming, in fact, in course of time, so swollen by padding that their use was abandoned by universal consent; and the second variety, going to the other extreme and fitting tightly to the limb, introduced. The next to arrive were the Gallic hose, very large and wide, and extending to the knee only; after which came the Venetian hose, reaching below the knee to the garter, where they were secured with silken bands. The trunk-hose, of every kind, were made of silk, velvet, satin, or damask. The nether stocks, or stockings, were of jarnsey, thread, fine yarn, and later, of silk, whilst the shoes partook more of the nature of slippers, and were variously decorated. Ruffs encircled the necks of the males as well as the females. Above the doublet was worn in the Spanish style a cloak of silk, velvet, or taffeta, and of a red, black, green, yellow, tawny, russet, or violet colour, many being bordered with long glass beads. Hats were conical and high, flat and broad, and flat and round, but in all cases were made of velvet or sarcenet, and ornamented with bunches of feathers. The robes of the ladies, made of bright-coloured velvet, silk, or fine cloth, had both tight and wide sleeves, and were branched or opened at the front of the skirt to expose the handsome petticoat beneath. The farthingale distended the dresses of our female ancestry from just below the bodice or stomacher, in a manner that few, we opine, of the fair sex would care to see revived at the present day. The ruff was of cambric or lawn, and when first introduced, moderate in its proportions, but like many other fashions of that epoch, became enlarged into an absurdity as years passed on. The hair of the ladies was curled, crisped, and arranged with most elaborate care; indeed, so curious and changeable were the coiffures that it would be tedious to our readers to offer more than this general description of them. Capes falling but a short way beyond the shoulders, and faced with fringe or velvet, were also worn. The costume of the gentlewomen during the seventeenth century, if the sombre garbs of the Roundhead families be excepted, consisted of an upper gown, which comprised a bodice and short skirt, the former being open over a laced stomacher, and the latter divided anteriorly, and its sides drawn back and looped up behind; a petticoat or under-dress, of expensive material, reaching to the ground; a yellow starched neckerchief, overspreading the shoulders and terminating on the bosom in two pointed ends; and a high crowned hat, beneath which long ringlets escaped and flowed down the back. The peasant girls or female farm servants had plain dresses, falling to the ankles, and usually tight sleeves and aprons. The bodices of some were open to the waist, but the stomachers, although laced, were of a very inferior kind, and the starched neckerchiefs were wanting. The gentlemen of the Fylde were influenced in their choice of garments according as their sympathies were with the King or Parliament, but there can be little question that in a locality so staunchly loyal as our own, the picturesque garb of the Cavaliers would predominate over the affectedly modest and plain attire of the partizans of Cromwell. The existence on the soil of such men as Sir Thomas Tyldesley, Thomas Singleton of Staining Hall, Thomas Hesketh of Mains Hall, who laid down their lives in the service of the crown, and numbers of others, who drew the sword in the cause of the throneless monarch, are fair evidence that the above conjecture is not hazarded without good reason. A doublet of silk, satin, or velvet, with large wide sleeves slashed up the front; a collar covered by a band of rich point lace, with Vandyke edging; a short cloak, thrown on one shoulder; short trousers, fringed and reaching to the wide tops of the high boots; a broad-leaved Flemish beaver hat, with a plume of feathers and band; and a sword belt and rapier, constituted the full costume of a Cavalier. Instead of the velvet doublet, a buff coat, richly laced, and encircled by a broad silk or satin scarf, fastened in a bow, was substituted when the inhabitants were under the excitement produced by actual war, in which so many took part. The hair, it should be mentioned, was worn long by the Cavaliers, and closely cropped by the Roundheads, whose dress offers no special features to our notice.

In the earlier part of last century the occupiers of Layton, Lytham, Fox, Burn, Mains, Rawcliffe, Rossall, Larbrick, etc., Halls, and others of equal social standing, who formed the gentry of the Fylde, and who consequently must be taken as our mirror of fashion, were clothed in straight square-cut waistcoats, extending to the knees, and of very gorgeous patterns; velvet breeches fastened below the knees; long silk stockings; buckled shoes, with high red heels; periwigs of monstrous size; hats, cocked on three sides; long lace neckerchiefs; and lastly, but far from the least important, a coat of rich material, having long stiff skirts and wide cuffs, turned back and adorned with gold or silver lace. The ladies had laced stomachers beneath a bodice with straight sleeves, ending at the elbow in moderately wide cuffs. The skirt of the dress was divided in front and looped up behind, disclosing a petticoat equalling or surpassing the richness of the upper garment, and trimmed with flounces and furbelows. The boots resembled those just described, but were more delicate in workmanship. The head-dress was composed of a species of cap, the lace material of which rose in three or four tiers, placed one above another, almost to a point, whilst the hair was brushed up and arranged in stiff curls, somewhat resembling a pyramid. This coiffure had only a brief reign, and was superseded by one less exalted, and of more elegant appearance. Hoops were introduced about 1720, and thirty years later silk aprons and gipsy straw hats, or small bonnets, were worn. In 1765 periwigs were discarded, and the natural hair was allowed to grow, being profusely sprinkled with powder, both by males and females. The country people were habited in long, double-breasted coats, made from frieze or homespun, and of a dark brown, grey, or other quiet shade; a light drugget waistcoat, red shag or plush breeches, and black stockings. There is no necessity to trace the costumes of our ancestors further than the point here reached, as their varieties present few phases of special interest, and probably the most striking are already sufficiently familiar to our readers. A sure, though somewhat unsteady, decline was shortly inaugurated in the sumptuous and elaborate dresses of the people, which continued its course of reform until the more economical and unostentatious dress of modern days had usurped the place of the showy habiliments of the eighteenth century.

The Country or district of the Fylde may be briefly described as broad and flat, for although in many places it is raised in gentle undulations, no hill of any altitude is to be seen upon its surface. The fertility of its soil has long been acknowledged, and a visit to its fruitful fields during the warm months of summer would disclose numbers of rich acres yellow with the ripening grain, while potatoe and bean-fields, meadow and pasture-lands, orchards and fruit gardens, are scattered over the wide area. Our design in the present instance is not, however, to enlarge upon these cultivated features, but to notice some of the more striking natural peculiarities, and to arrange in a classified list sundry of the rarer wild plants growing in the neighbourhood, enumerating also the different birds and sea-fowl, which are either natives or frequenters of the locality.

The features most calculated by their singularity to attract the attention of the stranger on surveying this division of the county are the moss-lands, the sand-hills, the mere at Marton, and the stunted appearance and inclination from the sea of those trees situated anywhere in the vicinity of the coast.

The great moss of the Fylde lies in the township of Marton, and extends six miles from north to south, and about one mile from east to west. On examining the structure of this moss, below the coarse herbage covering its surface, is discovered a substance called peat, brown and distinctly fibrous at its upper part, but becoming more and more compact as we descend, until at the bottom is presented a firm, dark-coloured, or even black mass, betraying less evidence, in some cases barely perceptible, of its fibrous formation. Beneath the peaty layer is a thick bed of clay, having imbedded in it, either partially or wholly, large trunks of trees—oak, yew, fir, etc., which, by their frequency and arrangement, show that at some period the extensive tract must have been a dense woodland, but at what particular era it is impossible, with any degree of exactness, to determine. The disinterment, however, of certain Celtic relics from the substance of the peat, which may be supposed to have belonged to the aboriginal Britons of the section, inclines us to the opinion that the lower layers of the moss were formed, and consequently the forest overthrown, anterior to the Roman occupation of our island, but how long before that time it was standing, must remain purely a matter of conjecture, unless some reliable proofs of its more precise antiquity are disclosed during operations in the turf. The manner in which the demolition of the forest was effected is also somewhat wrapt in obscurity, although it is probable that the noble trees of which it was composed were overturned and uprooted by the fury of some wide-spread inundation or the violence of some terrific hurricane. The fearful devastations, both or either of the elements here brought into action can accomplish, are too well marked in the histories of other countries for us to hesitate in ascribing to them the power of overthrowing, under similar turbulent conditions, even so substantial an obstruction as the forest must have been; but a careful study of the locality and of the several sudden incursions of the tide which have occurred during recent years, leads to the belief that the sea was the chief destructive agent, and that the gale which hurled the raging volumes of water over the low-lying lands at the south of Blackpool, and the then level wooded tract beyond, assisted only in the ruinous work. In support of such a hypothesis may be instanced the flood of 1833, when a tide, only estimated to rise to a height of sixteen feet, but greatly swollen by a furious storm from the south-west, burst over at that spot, swept away several dwelling-houses in its course, battered down the hedges, and laid waste the fields far into the surrounding country. Had this inundation occurred during the high spring tides, it is impossible to say to what extent its ravages might have been carried, but the incident as it stands, being within the recollection of many still living, and by no means a solitary example of the usual direction taken by the storm-driven waves, furnishes an apt illustration of the most natural way in which the downfall of the forest may have been accomplished. The Rev. W. Thornber, who has bestowed much time and labour on the subject, says:—“There are some facts that will go far to prove that these forests, once standing on Marton Moss, were overthrown by an inundation of the sea, viz., every tree on the Moss, as well as the Hawes, lies in a south-eastern direction from the shore; and the bank, which appears to have been the extent of this irruption, commencing at the Royal Hotel, runs exactly in the same direction. The shells, similar to those collected on the shore, intermixed with wrack of the sea, which are found in abundance under the peat, also corroborate this supposition. Moreover the tide is constantly depositing a marine silt similar to that which lies beneath the peat, and in some instances upon it.”

The wreck of such a vast number of trees would cause a great but gradual alteration in the surface of the ground. The masses of fallen timber, blocking up the streamlets and obstructing drainage, would create a more or less complete stagnation of water upon the land; the bark, branches, and leaves undergoing a process of decay would form the deepest layers of the peat; rank herbage and aquatic plants springing up and dying in endless succession, would form annual accumulations of matter, which in course of time would also be assimilated into peat, and in this manner the moss overlaying the original clayey surface and burying the ancient forest, would grow step by step to its present dimensions. Again, each layer of peat, as they were successively formed, would press upon those beneath, so that the weight of its own increase would give firmness and solidity to the substance of the moss. Thus we see that the whole secret of the creation or formation of the moss is simply a process of growth, decay, and accumulation of certain vegetable products annually repeated. The huge moss of Pilling and Rawcliffe owes its existence to similar phenomena.

The large mounds, or star-hills as they are called, which undulate the coast line from Lytham to South-Shore, are composed simply and purely of sand, covered over with a coarse species of herb, bearing the name of star-grass. Similar eminences at one time occupied the whole of the marine border of the Fylde, but in many places the encroaching tide has not only annihilated the hills themselves, but even usurped their sites. The town of Fleetwood is erected on a foundation of sand, and several extensive mounds of that nature exist in its vicinity. Below this light superficial substance, in some places very deep and thrown into its elevated forms by the long-continued action of the wind, is a subsoil resembling that found in other parts of the Fylde, and consisting of a clayey loam and alluvial matter. The diminutive size of those trees growing near the coast is due both to the openness and bleakness of the site, and the deleterious effects of the saline particles contained in the air; whilst the peculiar leaning from the water of their branches, and in many instances their trunks, is caused by the mechanical action or pressure of the strong winds and sea breezes prevailing from the west during three-fourths of the year.

Marton Mere, situated in the township indicated by its name, was formerly a lake of no inconsiderable extent, but drainage and the accumulation within its basin of sediment have reduced it to its present comparatively unimportant dimensions. Traces of the more extensive boundaries of the sheet of water in former days are still discernible along its banks, and at one time, it is stated, the wheel of a water-mill near to the village of Great Marton, was turned by a stream from the mere. The right of fishery in the lake, for such it was in the earlier periods, was the subject of legal contest in the reign of Edward III., and in 1590 John Singleton, of Staining Hall, held the privilege.

There are few districts of similar area which can boast so many and such interesting varieties of the feathered tribes, either natives or visitants, as the Fylde. Some of the rarest sea-fowl are occasionally seen along the coasts, while the fields and hedgerows abound with most of the melodious songsters of our island. Amongst the number of both land and sea birds which have been observed in the neighbourhood, either during the whole year or only in certain parts of it, may be mentioned the following:—

The fertile fields and sunny lanes of the Fylde afford ample opportunity for the botanist to indulge in his favourite pursuit, and a short ramble over any portion of the pleasant country will unfold to his inquiring gaze many of Nature’s most beautiful and interesting offsprings. Specimens, especially of the maritime varieties of several of the floral families, unobtainable in the inland districts, may here be found lightly planted on the loose, sandy margins of the shore. In the context it is not intended to enter into a description of the different plants or of the localities in which they may most commonly be found, but merely to enumerate some of the more important ones; and in the following list all those inhabitants of the district, which are likely to interest the student of Botany or lover of Nature, are arranged in their various groups or orders:—

The River Wyre rises in the hills of Wyersdale and Bleasdale; running in a south-westerly direction and passing the towns of Garstang and Church Town, it arrives at St. Michael’s, from which point its tortuous course is continued almost due west as far as Skippool. Thence winding past the ancient port of Wardleys, the stream, much widened, flows north and a little inclined towards the west, until it reaches the harbour of Fleetwood, situated at its mouth. From that seaport, the channel of the river, unaltered in direction, lies for a distance of nearly two miles between the sand-banks of North Wharf and Bernard’s Wharf, and finally terminates in Morecambe Bay, meeting the well-defined bed of the Lune at right angles. The origins of the Wyre in the hills consist of two small rivulets, and the stream formed by their union is joined near Scorton by the Grizedale Brook, whilst lower down, about two miles beyond the town of Garstang, it receives the Calder, rising on the slopes of Bleasdale. Before leaving the parish of Garstang, the Wyre is further increased by the brook springing from Fairsnape and Parlick Pike, which passes Claughton and Myerscough, not far from where it receives a small tributary from the south. At Skippool also a brook, the Skipton, which springs from the mere and marshy grounds of Marton Moss, pours its contents into the river.

The Wyre is crossed at Garstang by the aqueduct of the Preston, Lancaster, and Kendal canal, and at St. Michael’s, near the Church, it is spanned by a rather narrow but substantial stone bridge. For a distance of about six miles in the neighbourhood of the latter place the stream is enclosed within artificial banks, which in some parts have a descent of thirty feet. In spite of these precautions, however, high floods occasionally occur, when the swollen waters burst over the embankments and inundate the adjoining country. At Cart Ford there is a wooden structure of very limited width, connecting the opposing banks; and a few miles further down is the Shard Bridge, built of iron, and presenting a neat and elegant appearance. The river at that spot is 500 yards in breadth, and until the erection of the bridge in 1864, was crossed by means of a ferry-boat, or forded at low water by carts and conveyances. The ancient name of this ford was Ald-wath, and we learn from the following entry in the diary of Thomas Tyldesley, that in 1713 the charge for crossing by boat was 6d. each journey:—“September 14, 1713.—Went after dinr. to ffox Hall; pd. 6d. ffor boating att Sharde; saw ye ferry man carry out of ye boat a Scot and his pack, a sight I never saw beffor, beeing 56 years off age.”

About three hundred years since the venerable Harrison described the principal rivers of Lancashire, and from his writings at that time we quote as under:—

“The Wire ryseth eight or ten miles from Garstan, out of an hill in Wiresdale, from whence it runneth by Shireshed chappell, and then going by Wadland, Grenelaw Castle (which belongeth to the erle of Darbie), Garstan and Kyrkeland hall, it first receiveth the seconde Calder, that commeth down by Edmersey chappell, then another chanel increased with sundrie waters, the first water is called Plympton brooke. It riseth south of Gosner, and commeth by Craweforde hall, and eare long receyving the Barton becke, it proceedeth forward till it joyneth with the Brooke rill that commeth from Bowland Forest by Claughton hall, where M. Brokehales doth live, and so throw Mersco forest. After this confluence the Plime or Plimton water meeteth with the Calder, and then with the Wire, which passeth forth to Michael church and the Rawcliffes, and above Thorneton crosseth the Skipton, that goeth by Potton, then into the Wire rode, and finally into the sea, according to his nature.”

Drayton also has left the subjoined versified account of the Wyre, and as in addition to its poetic merit, it possesses the virtue of being a faithful description, we need not apologise for giving it unabridged:—

“Arising but a rill at first from Wyersdale’s lap,

Yet still receiving all her strength from her full mother’s pap,

As downe to seaward she her serious course doth ply,

Takes Calder coming in, to beare her company,

From Woolscrag’s cliffy foot, a hill to her at hand,

By that fayre forest knowne, within her Verge to stand.

So Bowland from her breast sends Brock her to attend,

As she a Forest is, so likewise doth she send

Her child, on Wyresdale Flood, the dainty Wyre to wayte,

With her assisting Rills, when Wyre is once repleat;

She in her crooked course to Seaward softly glides,

Where Pellin’s mighty Mosse, and Merton’s on her sides

Their boggy breasts outlay, and Skipton down doth crawle

To entertain this Wyre, attained to her fall.”[56]

White Hall, (formerly Upper Rawcliffe Hall,) Rawcliffe Hall, and Mains Hall, each of which will claim our attention more particularly hereafter, are seated on the banks of the Wyre, so also is the ancient house of Preesall-with-Hackensall, and although not properly comprised within the limits of this work, it has a right from its association with the river, to some description—a right the more readily conceded when it is known that in point of antiquity and interest, the hall and domain are well deserving of our consideration. The site of the mansion is a little removed from the brink of the stream, and almost directly opposite the southern extremity of Fleetwood. The present building is of considerable age, having been erected by Richard Fleetwood, of Rossall, in 1656, as indicated by an inscription over the main entrance, but there can be no question that the origin of its predecessor was co-eval, at least, with the grant of the manor by King John, when earl of Moreton, to Geoffrey, the Crossbowman, who, with his descendants, resided there. The whole of the large estate remained in the family of Geoffrey until the fifteenth century, when it was conveyed in marriage to James Pickering, of Layton, by Agnes, the sole offspring and heiress of the last male Hackensall, the title assumed, according to custom, by the Crossbowman. James Pickering left at his decease four daughters, co-heiresses, and married to Richard Butler, of Rawcliffe, Thomas Aglionby, Nicholas Aglionby, and James Leybourne, each of whom inherited one-fourth of the manor in right of his wife. In 1639 Sir Paul Fleetwood, of Rossall, held three-fourths of Hackensall, whilst the remaining quarter had descended to Henry Butler. Under the will of Richard Fleetwood, the re-erector of the hall, at that time occupied by his brother Francis, the three-fourths just named were sold by his trustees, being purchased, in part, for the Hornbys, of Poulton. Geoffrey Hornby, vicar of Winwick, and Robert Loxham, vicar of Poulton, held between them three-quarters of the manor in 1729, and William Elletson, of Parrox Hall, had possession of the other fourth, which is now the hereditary estate of Daniel Hope Elletson, esq., justice of the peace, residing at the same seat. At the end of the last century the Hornbys disposed of their share to John Bourne, gentleman, of Stalmine, from whom it descended to his second son, James Bourne, of Stalmine, and from him to his nephews, Thomas, James, and Peter, successively. The other portion of the manorial rights of the three-fourths was subsequently acquired by the last-surviving nephew, Peter Bourne, of Heathfield and Liverpool. Peter Bourne, esq., of Hackensall, married Margaret, the only daughter of James Drinkwater, esq., of Bent, in Lancashire, and left issue James, who is the present lord of three-quarters of the manor, and owner of the ancient Hall. James Bourne, esq., M.P., of Hackensall, and of Heathfield, near Liverpool, is Col.-Comdt. of the Royal Lancashire regiment of Militia Artillery, a deputy-lieutenant, and a justice of the peace of this county. Colonel Bourne has recently restored the old manor house, but in such a way as to preserve, and not obliterate, its links with a bygone age. The antique fire-places, one of which was protected by a massive arch of stone sweeping across the whole width of the room, have been renewed as before, and although the main doorway has been removed to another part of the building, the stone with the initials F. R. A., being those of Richard Fleetwood and Anne, his wife, has been reinstated in its original position above the newly-constructed lintel. Rumour affirms that during certain alterations two or three skeletons, supposed to be those of females, were found bricked up in a narrow chamber in one of the walls, and whilst confirming the discovery of a long secret recess, we dare not venture, for the evidence is somewhat contradictory, to hold ourselves responsible for the strict accuracy of the other part of the story, which suggests the enactment of a scene of revolting cruelty, similar to that introduced by Sir Walter Scott in the following lines:—

“Yet well the luckless wretch might shriek,

Well might her paleness terror speak!

For there was seen in that dark wall,

Two niches, narrow, deep, and tall.

Who enters at such grisly door

Shall ne’er I wean find exit more.

In each a slender meal was laid

Of roots, of water, and of bread.

...

Hewn stones and mortar were display’d,

And building tools in order laid.”

The moat has now been nearly filled up, but its extent and direction can still be pointed out. There are no indications of a chapel having formerly constituted part of the residential building, but several years since, when an outhouse was destroyed, at a short distance, about twenty yards, two gravestones were discovered, and it is probable that they were somewhere near, if not actually on the site of, the private chapel or oratory. One of the stones was broken up immediately, and the other is practically illegible, although three or four words, still preserved, prove that the inscription has not been in raised characters. The rights to wreckage, etc. on the foreshore of the manor have pertained to the lords of Hackensall from time immemorial, and still continue to be held and exercised as portion of the lordship.

Anterior to the establishment of a port at Fleetwood, or more correctly speaking, to the foundation of a town and the erection of wharfage, etc., on the warren forming the western boundary of Wyre estuary, Wardleys and Skippool, almost facing each other, were the harbours to which all commercial traffic on the river was directed. Ships of considerable size, freighted with cargoes of various sorts, found their way to those secluded havens, and even within the last few years, during high tides, vessels laden with grain have been berthed and unloaded in the narrow creek leading from Skippool bay, while bags of guano have often terminated their sea-voyages at Wardleys. A solitary warehouse, however, undated, but bearing on its battered exterior and decaying timbers the unmistakable stamp of time, is, at the present day, almost the only remaining witness to the former pretentions of the first named place. At Wardleys, three or four spacious warehouses, in a similarly dilapidated condition and now partially converted into shippons, the remainder being unused except as lumber-rooms or temporary storehouses for guano or some local agricultural produce, together with a stone wharf, are evidences of a fair amount of business having once been carried on at that little port.

In 1825 Baines described Wardleys as “a small seaport on the river Wyre, where vessels of 300 tons register may discharge their burdens, situated in the township of Stalmine with Stainall, in the hundred of Amounderness;” but in the year 1708 customs were established at Poulton in connection with Wardleys and Skippool. Nor should we be justified in limiting the antiquity of the ports to that date, for as early as 1590-1600, William and James Blackburne, of Thistleton, carried on an extensive trade with Russia, and there can be no doubt that their cargoes of merchandise, most likely flax and tallow, were landed on the banks of the Wyre at those ancient harbours. The father of the above merchants was the first of the family to take up his residence in this neighbourhood, and appears to have settled at Garstang, about 1550, from Yorkshire. That the commercial dealings of the partners were both large and successful is shown in the property acquired by William Blackburne, the elder brother, who purchased Newton, lands in Thistleton, and several other estates of considerable magnitude in the Fylde, all of which he bequeathed to his son and heir, Richard. Richard Blackburne married Jane, the daughter of John Aynesworth, of Newton, and had issue John of Eccleston; Richard, of Goosnargh; Thomas, of Orford and Newton; Edward, of Stockenbridge, near St. Michael’s-on-Wyre; Robert, who was suspected of being implicated in the Gunpowder Plot, but acquitted, the evidence being insufficient; Annie, who married—Nickson; and Elizabeth, the wife of William Standish. When the Singletons of Staining became extinct, the Hall and estate of that name passed to a William Blackburne, as heir-at-law, and there is great probability that he was a descendant of one of the sons of Richard Blackburne of Thistleton, Newton, etc.—most likely of John Blackburn, of Eccleston.

During the years more immediately previous to the opening of the new port at the mouth of the river, a great many large ships from America, laden with timber, and brigs from Russia, with flax and tallow, were discharged at Wardleys. A three masted vessel, for the foreign trade, was also constructed in the ship-yard attached to that place, but as far as can be learnt this was the only vessel of equal dimensions ever built there, repairs being the chief occupation of the workpeople.

Several of the officers connected with the Custom House at Poulton, were stationed at Knot End, opposite the Warren, living in the small cottage standing near the shore, in order to board the different craft as they entered the river, and pilot them up the stream to Wardleys. A large hotel is situated behind the site of the old ship-yard, and during the summer months is generally well patronised by visitors, to whom, as well as to the pleasure-parties arriving by water from Fleetwood, and by road from Blackpool, the hamlet is now mainly indebted for support. Some large mussels, the “Mytili angulosi,” but known amongst the natives of those parts as “Hambleton hookings,” were found formerly in large quantities a little lower down the river, but lately specimens of this fine shell-fish have been growing much scarcer. Dr. Leigh, in his Natural History of our county, informs us that pearls have frequently been discovered enclosed within the shells of these molluscs, and also that their popular name arises from the manner in which they are taken, the feat being accomplished “by plucking them from their Skeers, or Beds, with Hooks.” The tidal estuary of the Wyre embraces an area of three miles by two, and it is near to its termination that the port and town of Fleetwood are situated. Our purpose now is not to enter into a description of the harbour, which will be found in the chapter specially devoted to the seaport itself, but a few words as to the advantages derived from the nature of the river’s current and its bed, will not be out of place. Captain Denham, R.N., F.R.S., after inspecting the site of the proposed port on behalf of the promoters, issued a report in the month of January, 1840, and amongst other things, stated that during the first half of the ebb-tide, a reflux of backwater was produced which dipped with such a powerful under-scour as to preserve a natural basin, capable of riding ships of eighteen or twenty feet draught, at low water, spring tides; also that the anchorage ground, both within and without the harbour, was excellent. These facts alone seemed sufficient to warrant the gallant officer’s prediction that the undertaking would be successful and remunerative, but when in addition it is called to mind, that “as easy and safe as Wyre water” had for long been a proverb amongst the mariners of our coast, and that the harbour was, and is, perfectly sheltered from all winds, as well as connected with a railway terminus which communicates with Preston, Manchester, etc., we are astonished that comparatively so little encouragement has been given to it, and that now, thirty-five years from the date of this survey, the first dock is only approaching completion.

The river Wyre is plentifully supplied with fish of various sorts; in the higher parts of the stream trout and smelts may be found, whilst the lower portion and estuary contain codling, flounders, sea-perch, conger, sand eels, and occasionally salmon. The earliest enactments with regard to the fisheries connected with the last-named fish related to the Wyre, Ribble, and other rivers of Lancashire. In 1389, during the reign of Richard II., a law, which arranged the times and seasons when the fisheries in these rivers should be closed, and other matters affecting them, was passed and brought into force, being the first regulation of its kind.

The Ribble is associated with the Fylde only in so much as its tidal estuary is concerned, which forms the southern boundary of the district. Since 1837 great alterations have been effected in the channel of the river by the Ribble Navigation Improvement Company. The stream for the larger portion of its extent from Preston to the Naze Point has been confined within stone embankments, and its bed considerably deepened by dredging. During the progress of these improvements wide tracts of land have been reclaimed both north and south of the current. From Freckleton the river rapidly widens as it approaches the sea, so that a direct line drawn from Lytham to Southport across its mouth would pass over a distance of seven or eight miles. The channel here is shallow, while the sands on each side are flat and extensive, and midway in the estuary, at its lowest part, lies the far-famed Horse-bank, which divides the stream into a north and south current, scarcely discernible, however, after the tide has risen above the level of the bank. About one mile from the town of Lytham, in the direction of Preston, is a pool of moderate dimensions, having an open communication with the river, and formed into a small harbour or dock for yachts and vessels connected with the coasting trade. In the bed of the river, a little higher up than that locality, trunks of large trees are occasionally observed at low water, and many such remains of a once noble forest, which is believed to have extended from near the Welsh coast as far even as Morecambe, have been raised at different times during the operation of dredging.

The following descriptions of the Ribble, its source, course, and tributaries, were written, respectively, by the ancient topographer Harrison, and the poet Drayton, whose accounts of the Wyre have been previously quoted:—

“The Rybell, a river verie rich of Salmon and Lampreie, dooth in manner inviron Preston in Andernesse, and it riseth neere to Ribbesdale above Gisburne. It goeth from thence to Sawley or Salley, Chatburne, Woodington, Clitherow Castell, and beneath Mitton meeteth with the Odder, which ryseth not farre from the Cross of Grete in Yorkshire, and going thence to Shilburne, Newton, Radholme parke, and Stony hirst, it falleth ere long into Ribble water. From thence the Ribble hath not gone farre, but it meeteth with the Calder. Thys brooke ryseth above Holme Church, goeth by Townley and Burneley (where it receiveth a trifeling rill), thence to Higham, and ere long crossing one water that cometh from Wicoler, by Colne, and another by and by named Pidle brooke that runneth by Newechurch, in the Pidle: it meeteth with ye Calder, which passeth forth to Padiam, and thence (receyving a becke on the other side) it runneth on to Altham, and so to Martholme, where the Henburne brooke doth joyn with all, that goeth by Alkington chappell, Dunkinhalge, Rishton, and so into ye Calder as I have sayde before. The Calder therefore being thus inlarged, runneth forth to Reade (where M. Noell dwelleth), to Whalley, and soon after into Ribell, that goeth from this confluence to Salisbury hall, Ribchester, Osbaston, Sambury, Keuerden, Law, Ribles bridge, and then taketh in the Darwent, before it goeth by Pontwarth or Pentworth into the sea. The Darwent devideth Leland shire from Andernesse,[57] and it ryseth by east above Darwent Chappell, and soone after uniting it selfe with the Blackeburne, and Rodlesworthe water it goeth thorowe Howghton Parke, by Howghton towne, to Walton hall, and so into the Ribell. As for the Sannocke brooke, it ryseth somewhat above Longridge Chappell, goeth to Broughton towne, Cotham, Lee hall, and so into Ribell.”

“From Penigent’s proud foot as from my source I slide,

That mountain, my proud sire, in height of all his pride,

Takes pleasure in my course as in his first-born flood,

And Ingleborrough too, of that Olympian brood,

And Pendle, of the north, the highest hill that be,

Do wistly me behold, and are beheld of me.

These mountains make me proud, to gaze on me that stand,

So Longridge, once arrived on the Lancastrian strand,

Salutes me, and with smiles me to his soil invites,

So have I many a flood that forward me excites,

As Hodder that from Home attends me from my spring,

Then Calder, coming down from Blackstonedge doth bring

Me easily on my way to Preston, the greatest town

Wherewith my banks are blest, where, at my going down,

Clear Darwen on along me to the sea doth drive,

And in my spacious fall no sooner I arrive,

But Savock to the north from Longridge making way

To this my greatness adds, when in my ample bay,

Swart Dulas coming in from Wigan, with her aids,

Short Taud and Dartow small, two little country maids,

In these low watery lands and moory mosses bred,

Do see me safely laid in mighty Neptune’s bed,

And cutting in my course, even through the heart

Of this renowned shire, so equally it part,

As nature should have said, lo! thus I meant to do,

This flood divides this shire, thus equally in two.”

The beautiful scenery and historical associations of the Ribble render it the most interesting and charming of the several rivers which water the county of Lancaster. The quietude of its fair valley has on more than one occasion been rudely broken by the clash of arms, and students of our country’s history will readily call to mind that calamitous day to the Duke of Hamilton, when Cromwell routed the Highlanders under his command, near Preston,

“And Darwen stream with blood of Scots imbrued.”

Other instances of war-like doings along the banks of this river might be recounted, but as the neighbourhoods in which they occurred are not enclosed within the Fylde boundaries, we are perforce obliged to exclude them from this volume, and must refer those of our readers who are anxious to learn more both of them and of the river itself to other sources for the required information. The chief fish of the Ribble is of course its salmon, but in addition the estuary contains numbers of flounders and other varieties of the finny tribes similar to those found in the tidal portion of the Wyre. During the sixteenth century sturgeons seem to have been captured occasionally in the Ribble, and amongst the records of the duchy in 1536, there is a complaint that when “one certain sturgeon was found within the township of Warton and seized for the use of the King (who held the right of fishery there), and laid up in a house in Warton, one Christopher Bone, of Warton, and James Bradʳton, of the ley, with divers riotous persons, about the 6th of May last, did then and there take out of the said house the said sturgeon, and the said Bone hath at divers times and in like manner taken sturgeons and porpoises to his own use and the injury of his majesty.”[58]

As such a small part, and that far from the most important, of Ribble stream is really connected with the Fylde, and as it is not our intention to trespass beyond the limits of that district,—at least not knowingly, and the margin in the present instance is so clearly defined that no excuse could be offered for overstepping it,—we are compelled to content ourselves with this brief account, leaving much unsaid that is of considerable historical and general interest.

The Sea which washes over the westerly shore of the Fylde forms part of St. George’s Channel or the Irish Sea, whilst the narrow northern boundary of the same district is limited by the waters of Morecambe Bay. The main peculiarities to be noticed along the extensive line of this coast swept over by the billows of the Irish Sea, are the almost entire absence of seaweeds and the levelness of the sands; indeed, so gentle is the slope of the latter that its average declivity has been estimated at no more than one foot in every fifty yards, and to the flatness of this surface it is due that the beach is in a very great measure freed from putrifying heaps of fish and seaweed, for the rising tides glide with such swiftness over the level sandy beds that most driftmatters and impurities are left behind in the depths beyond low water mark. An analysis, made by Dr. Schweitzer, of the waters of the English coast, furnishes the following result:—

There are few, we imagine, who have not at one time or another admired the luminous appearance of the sea on certain evenings. This astonishing and beautiful phenomenon is brought about by the presence in the water of myriads of tiny beings, called Noctilucæ, which possess the power of emitting a phosphorescent light, and seemingly convert the bursting waves into masses of liquid fire. The immense expanse of sea spreading out from the westerly border of the Fylde has, independently of its association with the Gulph Stream, a marked influence in equalising the climate and averting those sudden and extreme degrees of heat and cold commonly experienced inland. The atmosphere over water does not undergo such rapid alterations in its temperature as that over land, and hence it happens that localities situated near the coast are cooler in summer and warmer in winter than others far removed from its vicinity. Most people will have observed that after a calm sunny day at the seaside, a breeze from the land invariably arises after sunset, due to the fact that the air over the earth being cooled and condensed much sooner than that over the sea, the heavier body of atmosphere endeavours to displace the warmer and lighter one. A gentle evaporation is daily taking place from the surface of the sea, by which the air becomes loaded with moisture, remaining suspended until the coolness of evening sets in, when it is deposited on the ground as dew. The water thus obtained from the deep is not pure brine, as might at first sight appear, but is freed from its salts by the process of natural distillation which has been undergone. Similar evaporation also goes on from the surfaces of the Ribble and Wyre, and it is doubtless chiefly owing to the Fylde being almost environed by water, constantly disseminating dew, that its fecundity is not only so great, but also so constant. The following is a list of the seaweeds to be found on the coast:—

The subjoined table contains the names of some of the crustaceous animals and molluscs commonly met with in the neighbourhood:—

CHAPTER VI.
THE PEDIGREES OF ANCIENT FAMILIES.

ALLEN OF ROSSALL HALL.

The Allens who resided at Rossall Hall for a period of more than half a century, and by intermarriage became connected with the Westbys of Mowbreck, the Heskeths of Mains, and the Gillows of Bryning, sprang from the county of Stafford. At the time of the Protestant Reformation, George Allen, of Brookhouse, in the division just mentioned, held a long lease of the Grange and Hall of Rossall from a kinsman of his family, one of the abbots of Deulacres, a Staffordshire monastery, to which the estate had been granted by King John. George Allen at his death left one son, John, who resided at the Hall, and subsequently married Jane, the sister of Thomas Lister, of Arnold Biggin, in Yorkshire. The offspring of this marriage were Richard, William, Gabriel, George, who espoused Elizabeth, the daughter of William Westby, of Mowbreck; Mary, afterwards the wife of Thomas Worthington, of Blainscow; Elizabeth, subsequently the wife of William Hesketh, of Mains Hall; and Anne, who married George Gillow, of Bryning. Richard Allen, of Rossall Hall, the eldest son, left at his demise a widow with three daughters, named respectively, Helen, Catherine, and Mary, who were deprived of their possessions and rights in the Grange in the year 1583 by Edmund Fleetwood, whose father had purchased the reversion of the lease from Henry VIII., at the time when the larger monastic institutions were dissolved in England. The widow and her daughters fled to Rheims to escape further persecution, where they were hospitably received by their near relative, Cardinal William Allen, who interested the princely family of Guise in their behalf and so obtained for them the means of subsistence.

William Allen, the second son of John Allen, of Rossall Hall, was born in 1532, and at the early age of fifteen entered Oriel College, Oxford, under the tutorship of Morgan Philips, perhaps the most eminent logician of his day. Three years later he was elected to a fellowship. Upon the accession of Mary he entered the church, and in 1556 was made principal of St. Mary’s Hall, acting as Proctor for the two succeeding years. In 1558 he was created canon of York, but on the accession of Elizabeth, he refused the Protestant oaths, was deprived of his fellowship, and, in 1560, retired to Louvaine, where he wrote his first work, entitled “A Defence of the Doctrine of Catholics, concerning Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead,” in answer to an attack on those dogmas by Bishop Jewell. In 1565, the year in which this publication appeared and fermented great excitement both here and abroad, William Allen determined, in spite of the extreme dangers of such an act, to visit his native country, more especially the home of his fathers at Rossall. Religious zeal prevented his active spirit from being long at rest; after residing in England about three years and visiting different parts of Lancashire, seeking converts to his creed, he was obliged to secrete himself from the eye of the law amongst his friends, Layton Hall and Mains Hall being two of his hiding places, until a suitable opportunity occurred for escaping over to the continent. Flanders was his destination, and from there he went to Mechlin, afterwards taking up his abode at Douai, where he obtained a doctor’s degree, and established an English seminary. This college, we learn from the “Mem: Miss: Priests: Ed. 1741,” was founded in 1568 “to train up English scholars in virtue and learning, and to qualify them to labour in the vineyard of the Lord, on their return to their native country; it was the first college in the Christian world, instituted according to the model given by the council of Trent.”

Whilst engaged at the above scholastic institution, William Allen was appointed canon of Cambray; subsequently when the English council applied to the ruling powers of the Spanish Netherlands to suppress the college of Douai, the Doctor and his assistants were received under the protection of the house of Guise. Afterwards Doctor Allen, on being appointed canon of Rheims, established another seminary in that city. At that time perhaps no one was more admired and revered by the Catholic party abroad, and detested by the Protestant subjects of England, than William Allen. He was even accused by his countrymen at home of having traitorously instigated Philip II. of Spain, to attempt the invasion and conquest of England, and although he strenuously denied any agency in that matter, it is certain that after the defeat of the Armada, he wrote a defence of Sir William Stanley and Sir Rowland York, who had assisted the enemy. In 1587, he was made cardinal of St. Martin in Montibus by Pope Sectus V., and a little later was presented by the king of Spain to a rich abbey in Naples with promises of still higher preferment. In 1588 he published the “Declaration of the Sentence of Sixtus the Fifth,” which was directed against the government of the British queen, whom he declared an usurper, obstinate and impenitent, and for these reasons to be deprived. As an appendix to the work he issued shortly afterwards an “Admonition to the Nobility and People of England and Ireland,” in which he pronounced the queen an illegitimate daughter of Henry VIII. Although the effect of these publications on the English nation was not, as he hoped, to arouse the people to open rebellion, or in any way to advance the Catholic cause, the efforts of the cardinal were so far appreciated by the king of Spain that he promoted him to the archbishopric of Mechlin. He lived at Rome during the remainder of his life in great luxury and magnificence. On October 6th, 1594, this remarkable man expired at his palace, in the 63rd year of his age, and was buried with great pomp at the English church of the Holy Trinity in the ancient imperial city.

BUTLER OF RAWCLIFFE HALL.

The name of Butler, or as it was formerly written Botiler, belonged to an office in existence in earlier times, and was first assumed by Theobald Walter, who married Maud, the sister of Thomas à Becket, on being appointed Butler of Ireland.

Theobald Walter-Botiler gave to his relative Richard Pincerna, or Botiler, as the family was afterwards called, the whole of Out Rawcliffe and one carucate of land in Staynole. This gentleman was the founder of that branch of the Butlers which was established at Rawcliffe Hall for so many generations. Sir Richard Botiler, of Rawcliffe, married Alicia, in 1281, the daughter of William de Carleton, and thus obtained the manor of Inskip. He had issue—William, Henry, Richard, Edmund, and Galfrid. Richard Botiler, the third son, who had some possessions in Marton, left at his death one son, also named Richard, who was living in 1323, and became the progenitor of the Butlers of Kirkland. William, the eldest son, espoused Johanna de Sifewast, a widow, by whom he had Nicholas de Botiler, who was alive in 1322, and had issue by his wife Olivia, one son, William Botiler, living in 1390. William Botiler had three children—John, Richard, and Eleanor. John Botiler was created a knight, and in 1393-4-5 was High Sheriff of the county of Lancaster. Sir John Botiler left at his death, in 1404, three sons and one daughter, the offspring of his marriage with Isabella, his second wife, who was the widow of Sir John Butler, of Bewsey. Nicholas, the eldest son, was also twice married, and had issue by his first wife, Margeria, the daughter of Sir Richard Kirkeby,—John and Isabella Botiler. John Botiler espoused, in 1448, Elizabeth, the daughter of William Botiler, of Warrington, and had issue—Nicholas and Elizabeth Botiler. Nicholas Botiler married Alice, the daughter of Sir Thomas Radcliffe, knt., and was succeeded by his eldest son John Botiler, who subsequently espoused Elizabeth, the daughter and heiress of Sir John Lawrence, knt., and had issue—William, James, Richard, and Robert Botiler. James Botiler, the second son, inherited the estates, most probably owing to the death of William, his elder brother, and married Elizabeth, the daughter of Sir Thomas Molyneux, knt., of Larbrick Hall. James Botiler, or Butler, was living in 1500, but died shortly afterwards, leaving two sons and two daughters—John, Nicholas, Isabella, and Elizabeth. John, the elder son, had issue four daughters, whilst Nicholas, the second son, had issue by his first wife, the daughter of Richard Bold, of Bold, two sons, Richard and Henry, and by his second wife, Isabel, the daughter and co-heiress of John Clayton, of Clayton, one daughter, who died in 1606. Richard Butler married Agnes, the daughter of Sir Richard Houghton, knt., but having no offspring, the estates of Rawcliffe passed to William Butler, the eldest son of his younger brother, Henry Butler, somewhere about 1627. William Butler espoused Elizabeth, the daughter of Cuthbert Clifton, of Westby, by whom he had one son, Henry, who was thrice married, and had numerous offspring. Richard, the eldest son of Henry Butler by his first wife, Dorothy, the daughter of Henry Stanley, of Bickerstaffe, died before his father, but left several sons, one of whom, also named Richard, succeeded to the Rawcliffe property, and was thirty-two years of age in 1664; another, Nicholas, was a colonel in the time of Charles I.; and another, John, was a citizen of London. Richard Butler espoused Katherine, the daughter of Thomas Carus, of Halton, by whom he had a large family, the eldest of which, Henry, was six years of age in 1664. Henry Butler, of Rawcliffe, espoused as his first wife, Katherine, the granddaughter, and subsequently heiress, of Sir John Girlington, knt., of Thurland Castle, and had issue—Richard, Christopher, Philip, Mary, and Katherine. Henry Butler, and Richard, his eldest son, took part with the Pretender in the rebellion of 1715, and for this piece of disaffection their estates were confiscated by the crown, and afterwards sold. Henry Butler made his escape over to France, but Richard was seized, tried, and condemned to death. He died in prison, however, in 1716, before the time appointed for his sentence to be carried out, leaving an only child, Catherine, by his wife, Mary, the daughter of Henry Curwen, of Workington, who married Edward Markham, of Ollarton, in the county of Nottingham, and died a minor without issue. Henry Butler lived in the Isle of Man for several years, and espoused Elizabeth Butler, of Kirkland, his third wife, but had no further issue.

CLIFTON OF CLIFTON, WESTBY, AND LYTHAM.

The family of the Cliftons, whose present seat is Lytham Hall, has been associated with the Fylde for many centuries. The earliest ancestor of whom there exists any authentic record, was Sir William de Clyfton, who lived in the time of William II., surnamed Rufus, and during the last year of that monarch’s reign, A.D. 1100, gave certain lands in Salwick to his son William upon his marriage. In 1258 a namesake and descendant of this William de Clyfton held ten carucates of land in Amounderness, and was a collector of aids for the county of Lancaster. His son Gilbert de Clyfton was lord of the manors of Clifton, Westby, Fylde-Plumpton, etc., and High Sheriff of the county in the years 1278, 1287, and 1289. He died in 1324, during the reign of Edward II., and was succeeded by his eldest son, Sir William de Clifton, who was Knight of the Shire for Lancaster 1302-1304. Sir William de Clifton,[59] knt., the son of the latter gentleman, came into possession of the estates on the demise of his father, and married in 1329, Margaret, the daughter of Sir R. Shireburne, knt., of Stonyhurst, by whom he had issue one son, Nicholas, afterwards knighted. He also entailed the manors of Clifton and Westby on his male issue, and settled the manor of Goosnargh upon his son and heir. He died in 1365. Sir Nicholas de Clifton, during one portion of his life, held the post of Governor of the Castle of Ham, in Picardy. He married Margaret, the daughter of Sir Thomas West, of Snitterfield, in Warwickshire, and had issue two sons—Robert and Thomas. The former, who succeeded him, was Knight of the Shire 1382-1383, and espoused Eleyne, the daughter of Sir Robert Ursewyck, knt., by whom he had three sons—Thomas, Roger, and James. In course of time, Thomas, the eldest, became the representative of the family, and married Agnes, the daughter of Sir Richard Molyneux, of Sefton. This gentleman (Thomas Clifton), accompanied the army of Henry V., when that monarch invaded France in 1415. He settled Goosnargh and Wood-Plumpton upon his second son, James, while the other portion of the estates passed, on his death in 1442, to Richard, his heir. Richard Clifton formed a matrimonial alliance with Alice, the daughter of John Butler, of Rawcliffe, from which sprang one child, James Clifton, who afterwards espoused Alice, the daughter of Robert Lawrence, of Ashton. The offspring of the latter union were Robert and John Clifton. The former on inheriting the property married Margaret, the daughter of Nicholas Butler, of Bewsey, in Lancashire. His children were Cuthbert and William; and now, for a few generations, we have two separate branches, the descendants of these gentlemen, which afterwards became united in the persons of their respective representatives:—

[60]

This Thomas Clifton retained the Fairsnape estates, which he had inherited from his mother, during his lifetime, but on his decease they passed to his uncle. He married Eleanora Alathea, the daughter of Richard Walmsley, of Dunkenhalgh, in Lancashire. At his death he left a family of five daughters and two sons, the eldest of whom, Thomas Clifton, of Clifton, Westby, and Lytham, subsequently espoused Mary, the daughter of the fifth Viscount Molyneux. His heir, also Thomas, and born in 1728, rebuilt Lytham Hall, and allied himself to the noble house of Abingdon by marrying, as his third wife, Lady Jane Bertie, the daughter of the third earl. The children of this union were seven, and John, the eldest, born in 1764, inherited the estates, and married Elizabeth, the daughter of Thomas Horsley Widdrington-Riddell, of Felton Park, Northumberland. John Clifton was succeeded by his eldest son, Thomas, who had four brothers and three sisters—John, William, Charles, Mary, Harriet, and Elizabeth. Thomas Clifton, of Clifton and Lytham, born in 1788, was a justice of the peace, a deputy-lieutenant, and in 1835, High Sheriff of the county of Lancaster. He married Hetty, the daughter of Pellegrine Trevis, an Italian gentleman of ancient lineage, by whom he had issue John Talbot, born in 1819; Thomas Henry, lieut.-colonel in the army, and knight of the Legion of Honour and of the Mejidie; Edward Arthur, died abroad in 1850; Charles Frederick, who espoused Lady Edith Maud, eldest daughter of the second Marquis of Hastings, and assumed in 1859, by act of parliament, the arms and surname of Abney Hasting; and Augustus Wykenham, late captain in the Rifle Brigade, who married Lady Bertha Lelgarde Hastings, second daughter of the second Marquis of Hastings. John Talbot Clifton, esq., is still living, and is the present lord of Lytham, Clifton, etc. He was for some years colonel of the 1st. Royal Lancashire Militia, and sat in Parliament from 1844 to 1847 as Member for North Lancashire. In 1844 he married Eleanor Cicily, the daughter of the Hon. Colonel Lowther, M.P., and has one son, Thomas Henry Clifton, esq., who was born in 1845, and is now one of the Members of Parliament for North Lancashire. John Talbot Clifton, esq., is a justice of the peace, and deputy-lieutenant of this county. Thomas Henry Clifton, esq., M.P., espoused, in 1867, Madeline Diana Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Sir Andrew Agnew, bart., and has issue several children.

In 1872 Henry Lowther succeeded his uncle as third earl of Lonsdale, and at the same time his sisters Eleanor Cicily, the wife of John Talbot Clifton, esq., of Lytham Hall, and Augusta Mary, the wife of the Right Hon. Gerard James Noel, M.P., younger son of the first earl of Gainsborough, were elevated to the rank of earl’s daughters.

FLEETWOOD OF ROSSALL HALL.

This family sprang originally from Little Plumpton in the Fylde. Henry Fleetwood being the first of whom there is any reliable record, and of him nothing is known beyond the place of his residence, and the fact that he had a son named Edmund. Edmund Fleetwood married Elizabeth Holland, of Downholme, and was living about the middle and earlier portion of the latter half of the fifteenth century. From that marriage there sprang one son, William Fleetwood, who subsequently espoused Ellyn, the daughter of Robert Standish, and had issue John, Thomas, and Robert Fleetwood. Of these three sons, Thomas, the second, resided at Vach in the county of Buckingham, and at the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII., about 1536, purchased from that monarch the reversion of the lease of Rossall Grange, then held by the Allens from the Abbot and convent of Deulacres, in Staffordshire. Thomas Fleetwood married Barbara, the cousin and heiress of Andrew Frances, of London, and had issue five sons, the second and third of whom were knighted later in life, whilst the eldest, Edmund, came into possession of Rossall Hall and estate in 1583, after the demise of Richard Allen, whose widow and daughters were ejected. Thus Edmund Fleetwood was the first of the name to reside at Rossall, where he died about forty years later. This gentleman married Elizabeth, the daughter of John Cheney, of Chesham Boys, in Buckinghamshire, and had issue several sons and daughters. Paul, the eldest son and heir, who succeeded him, was knighted by either James I. or Charles I., and married Jane, the daughter of Richard Argall from the county of Kent, by whom he had three sons and two daughters. Edmund, the eldest son, had no male issue, and at his death, in 1644, Richard, his brother, succeeded to the property and resided at Rossall Hall. Richard Fleetwood, who was only fifteen years of age when the death of his predecessor occurred, subsequently espoused a lady, named Anne Mayo, from the county of Herts, by whom he had only two children, a son and a daughter, and as the former died in youth, the estate passed to the next male heir on his demise. The heir was found in the person of Francis, of Hackensall Hall, the brother of Richard Fleetwood and the third son of Sir Paul Fleetwood. Francis Fleetwood, of Rossall, married Mary, the daughter of C. Foster, of Preesall, and had issue Richard Fleetwood, who succeeded him, and a daughter. Richard Fleetwood resided at Rossall Hall, and married Margaret, the daughter of Edwin Fleetwood, of Leyland, in 1674. The offspring of that union were two sons, Edward and Paul, and a daughter Margaret. Edward, the heir, was born in 1682, and practised for some time as an attorney in Ireland. On the death of his father, however, he inherited the property, and took up his abode at the ancestral Hall. He espoused Sarah, the daughter of Edward Veale, of Whinney Heys. Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, Blackpool, was on terms of friendship and intimacy with the Fleetwoods of Rossall at that period, and on the fourteenth of April, 1714, the following entry occurs in his diary, referring to Edward Fleetwood, the lord of the manor, and his brother Paul, also Edward Veale, the father of Mrs. Ed. Fleetwood, whom, for some reason unknown, the diarist invariably designated Captain Veale:—“Went to Rosshall. Dinᵈ with the trustys, yᵉ Lord & his lady, Mr. Paull, and Capᵗᵗ Veal. Gave I. Gardiner 1s., and a boy 6d.; soe to ffox Hall.”

Paul Fleetwood, the younger brother of the “Lord” died in 1727 and was buried at Kirkham, where some of his descendants still exist in very humble circumstances.

The offspring of Edward Fleetwood consisted only of one child, a daughter, named Margaret, who was born in 1715, and to whom the estates appear to have descended on the decease of her father. On the sixteenth of February, 1733, she married, at Bispham church, Roger Hesketh, of North Meols and Tulketh. Roger Hesketh and his lady resided at Rossall Hall until their respective demises, which happened, the latter in 1752, and the former in 1791. Fleetwood and Sarah Hesketh were the children of their union. On the decease of his father at the ripe age of 81 years, the son and heir, Fleetwood, had already been dead 22 years, and consequently his son, Bold Fleetwood Hesketh, the eldest offspring of his marriage, in 1759, with Frances, the third daughter of Peter Bold, of Bold Hall, in the county of Lancaster, succeeded his grandfather Roger Hesketh. Bold Fleetwood Hesketh, who was born in 1762, died unmarried in 1819, and was buried at Poulton, his younger brother, Robert Hesketh, inheriting the Hall and estates. Robert Hesketh was in his 55th year when he became possessed of the property, and had already been married 29 years to Maria, the daughter of Henry Rawlinson, of Lancaster, by whom he had a numerous family. His four eldest sons died in youth and unmarried, the oldest having only attained the age of twenty three, so that at his decease in 1824 he was succeeded by his fifth son, Peter Hesketh. This gentleman, who was born in 1801, espoused at Dover, in 1826, Eliza Delamaire, the daughter of Sir Theophilus J. Metcalf, of Fern Hill, Berkshire, by whom he had several children, who died in early youth. As his second wife he married, in 1837, Verginie Marie, the daughter of Senor Pedro Garcia, and had issue one son, Peter Louis Hesketh. In 1831, Peter Hesketh obtained power by royal license to adopt the surname of Fleetwood in addition to his own, and in 1838 he was created a baronet. In 1844, Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood vacated Rossall Hall, and the site is now occupied by a large public educational institution, denominated the Northern Church of England School. Sir P. H. Fleetwood died, at Brighton, in 1866, leaving one son and heir, the Rev. Sir Peter Louis Hesketh Fleetwood, bart., M.A., of Sunbury on Thames, in the county of Middlesex. The Rev. Charles Hesketh, M.A., rector of North Meols, is the younger brother of the late Sir P. H. Fleetwood, and consequently uncle to the present baronet.

FFRANCE OF LITTLE ECCLESTON HALL.

William, the son of John ffrance, who married the younger daughter of Richard Kerston, of Little Eccleston, was the first of this family to reside at the Hall, and he was living there at the beginning of the seventeenth century. William ffrance had two sons and a daughter—John, born 1647; Henry, born 1649; and Alice, born 1653. John, the eldest son, succeeded to the Hall and estates on the demise of his father, and married Deborah Elston, of Brockholes, by whom he had issue—Robert, who died in 1671; Anne, died 1672; Thomas, died 1672; Deborah, died 1673; John, born 1675; William, died 1680; Henry, died 1676; Mary, died 1701; and Edward, died 1703. John ffrance, senʳ., survived all his sons except John and Edward, and on his death, in 1690, was succeeded by the former and elder of the two brothers. John ffrance, like his father, resided at the Hall, and espoused Joan, daughter of John Cross, of Cross Hall, by whom he had issue—John, born 1699; Anne, died 1702; and Henry, died 1707. John ffrance died in 1762, and his eldest son, John, inherited the estates. This John ffrance married Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of Thomas Roe, of Out Rawcliffe, and by that union became possessed, later, of Rawcliffe manor and Hall, to which the family of ffrance removed. John ffrance, of Rawcliffe Hall, the son and heir of John and Elizabeth ffrance, of Little Eccleston Hall, and subsequently of Rawcliffe, died childless in 1817, aged 91 years, and bequeathed his property to Thomas Wilson, of Preston, who assumed the name of ffrance.[61]

HESKETH OF MAINS HALL.

This family was descended from the Heskeths, of Rufford, through William Hesketh, of Aughton, the sixth son of Thomas Hesketh, of Rufford. Bartholomew, the son of William Hesketh, of Aughton, succeeded to his father’s estates, and married Mary, the daughter of William Norris, of Speke, by whom he had one son, George, residing at Little Poulton Hall in 1570. George Hesketh married Dorothy, the daughter of William Westby, of Mowbreck, and had issue a son, William, who, on his father’s death, somewhere about 1571, inherited considerable property, comprising possessions in no less than twenty-eight different townships in Lancashire. William Hesketh, who was living in 1613, married Elizabeth, the daughter of John Allen, of Rossall Hall, and sister to Cardinal Allen. The children springing from that union were William and Wilfrid. William, the elder son, is the first of the Heskeths mentioned as inhabiting Mains Hall, and he appears to have been living there in 1613. We have no documents throwing any certain light upon the way in which he gained possession of the seat, but it is most probable that he purchased it. William Hesketh, of Mains Hall, espoused Anne, the daughter of Hugh Anderton of Euxton, and had issue—Thomas, Roger, John, William, Hugh, George, Anne, Alice, and Mary. Thomas, the eldest son, was nine years old in 1613, hence it is extremely likely that he was the first representative of the family born at Mains Hall. Thomas Hesketh was twice married; the first time to Anne, the daughter of Simon Haydock, of Hezantford, and after her decease, to Mary, the daughter of John Westby, of Westby and Mowbreck. The children of his first marriage were William; Thomas, an officer in the royalist army, and slain at Brindle in 1651; Anne, who became the wife of Thomas Nelson, of Fairhurst; and Margaret, afterwards the wife of Major George Westby, of Upper Rawcliffe. William, the elder son, married Perpetua, the daughter of Thomas Westby, of Mowbreck, and had issue—Thomas, born in 1659; William, who died in infancy; John; Anne, married to Richard Leckonby, of Leckonby House, Great Eccleston; Helen; Dorothy, married to Thomas Wilkinson, of Claughton; Perpetua, died in infancy; and six other daughters, all of whom died in youth. Thomas Hesketh, the eldest son, left four sons and three daughters—William; Thomas, who was a priest; John; George; Mary; Perpetua; and Anne. William Hesketh, the eldest of these sons, was living at the same time as Thomas Tyldesley, who died in 1714, and was a frequent visitor at Fox Hall. He married Mary, the daughter of John Brockholes, of Claughton, and heiress to her brother William Brockholes, of Claughton, and had issue—Thomas, Roger, William, Joseph, James, Catherine (an abbess), Margaret, Anne, Mary (a nun), and Aloysia (a nun). Thomas, the eldest son, inherited the property of his deceased uncle, William Brockholes, and assumed the name and arms of Brockholes. He died in 1766. Roger, the second son, also died in 1766. William, the third son, was born in 1717, and in later years entered the “Society of Jesus,” dying in 1741. Joseph succeeded to the Brockholes’ estates on the death of his brother Thomas, and, like him, assumed the name of Brockholes. He married Constantia, the daughter of Bazil Fitzherbert, of Swinnerton, and dying in a few years without issue, was succeeded by his sole remaining brother, James, who also assumed the name and arms of Brockholes, and some years afterwards died unmarried. The Brockholes’ property now passed, under the will of Joseph Hesketh-Brockholes, to William Fitzherbert, the brother of his widow; and that gentleman, after the manner of his predecessors, assumed the name of Brockholes. He espoused Mary, the daughter and co-heiress of James Windsor Heneage, of Cadeby, Lincolnshire, and had issue—Thomas Fitzherbert-Brockholes, of Claughton; Catherine, abbess of the Benedictines at Ghent; Margaret; Ann; Mary, who became a nun; and Frances.

HORNBY OF POULTON.

The Hornbys, of Poulton, were descended from Hugh Hornby, of Singleton, who died about 1638, after having so far impoverished himself during the civil wars as to be obliged to dispose of his estate at Bankfield, inherited from his sister, and purchased from him by the Harrisons. Geoffrey Hornby, the son of this gentleman, practised very successfully as a solicitor in Preston, and probably was the first to acquire property in Poulton. Edmund Hornby, his eldest son, of Poulton, where he also practised as a solicitor, and Scale Hall, married Dorothy, the daughter of Geoffrey Rishton, of Antley, in Lancashire, Member of Parliament for Preston, and had issue—Geoffrey, George, and Anne. George, the second son, went into holy orders, became rector of Whittingham, and subsequently died without surviving offspring. Anne Hornby married Edmund Cole, of Beaumont Cote, near Lancaster; and Geoffrey Hornby, who inherited the Poulton property, as well as Scale Hall, espoused Susannah, the daughter and heiress of Edward Sherdley, of Kirkham, gentleman, by whom he had issue—Edmund and Geoffrey, the latter dying unmarried in 1801. Geoffrey Hornby, who died in 1732, was buried in Poulton church, being succeeded by his son Edmund, who came into the possessions at Poulton and Scale. Edmund Hornby, born in 1728, married Margaret, the daughter of John Winckley, of Brockholes, and had issue one son, Geoffrey, and three daughters. At his decease, in 1766, the estates descended to his only son and heir, Geoffrey, born at Layton Hall in 1750, who, after being High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1774, and for some time colonel of a Lancashire regiment of militia, entered the church and became rector of Winwick. The Rev. Geoffrey Hornby espoused the Hon. Lucy Smith Stanley, daughter of Lord Strange, and sister of the twelfth earl of Derby, and had issue; but the departure of this representative of the family from the homes of his fathers severed the close connection between the town of Poulton and the name of Hornby, after an existence of about a century.

HORNBY OF RIBBY HALL.

Richard Hornby, of Newton, who was born in 1613, married Elizabeth, the daughter of Christopher Walmsley, of Elston, and had issue a son, William Hornby, also of Newton. That gentleman had several children by his wife Isabel, the eldest of whom, Robert Hornby, was born in 1690, and espoused Elizabeth Sharrock, of Clifton, leaving issue by her at his decease in 1768, three sons—Hugh, William, and Richard. Hugh Hornby took up his abode at Kirkham, where he married Margaret, the daughter and heiress of Joseph Hankinson, of the same place, and had issue—Joseph, born in 1748; Robert, born in 1750, and died in 1776; Thomas, of Kirkham, born in 1759, married Cicely, the daughter of Thomas Langton, of that town, and died in 1824, having had a family of two sons and five daughters; William, of Kirkham; John, of Blackburn and Raikes Hall, Blackpool, born in 1763; Hugh, vicar of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre, born in 1765; Alice, who became the wife of Richard Birley, of Blackburn; and Elizabeth. Joseph Hornby was a deputy-lieutenant of the county of Lancaster, and erected Ribby Hall. He married Margaret, the daughter of Robert Wilson, of Preston, by whom he had Hugh; Margaret, who espoused William Langton, of Manchester; and Alice, who died a spinster. Hugh Hornby, the only son, born in 1799, succeeded to the Hall and lands on the death of his father in 1832, and left issue at his own demise, in 1849, Hugh Hilton, Margaret Anne, and Mary Alice. Hugh Hilton Hornby, of Ribby Hall, esq., who married his relative, Georgina, the daughter of the Rev. Robert Hornby, M.A., J.P., in 1868, is the present representative of the family, and was born in 1836.

John Hornby, of Blackburn and Raikes Hall, married Alice Kendal, a widow, and the daughter of Daniel Backhouse, of Liverpool, by whom he had four sons—Daniel, born in 1800, who espoused Frances, daughter of John Birley, of Manchester, and dying in 1863, left issue, Fanny Backhouse and Margaret Alice Hornby; Robert, born in 1804, M.A., a clergyman and justice of the peace, who married Maria Leyland, daughter of Sir William Fielden, bart., and had issue, Robert Montagu, William St. John Sumner, Leyland, Frederick Fielden, Henry Wallace, Hugh, and ten daughters, the first and third sons being captains in the army, and the second in the royal navy; William Henry, of Staining Hall, J.P. and D.L., born in 1805, and Member of Parliament for Blackburn from 1857 to 1869, married Susannah, only child of Edward Birley, of Kirkham, by whom he had John, Edward Kenworthy, Henry Sudell, William Henry, Cecil Lumsden, Albert Neilson, Charles Herbert, Elizabeth Henriana, Frances Mary, Augusta Margaret, and Caroline Louisa, of whom Edward Kenworthy Hornby, esq., has sat as M.P. for Blackburn; John, M.A., formerly M.P. for Blackburn, and born 1810, married Margaret, daughter of the Rev. Christopher Bird, having issue, John Frederick, Wilfrid Bird, Edith Diana, and Clara Margaret. The Rev. Hugh Hornby, M.A., sixth son of Hugh Hornby, of Kirkham, was vicar of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre, and espoused Ann, daughter of Dr. Joshua Starky, a physician, of Redbales, having issue one son, William, now the Venerable Archdeacon Hornby, M.A., and the present vicar of St. Michael’s, born in 1810. Archdeacon Hornby married, firstly, Ellen, daughter of William Cross, esq., of Red Scar, and four years after her decease, in 1844, Susan Charlotte, daughter of Admiral Sir Phipps Hornby, K.C.B. The offspring of the earlier union were two—William Hugh and Joseph Starky, both of whom died young; whilst those of the second marriage are—William, Hugh Phipps, Phipps John, James John, William Starky, Susan, and Anne Lucy, the eldest of whom, William, died in 1858, aged thirteen years.

LECKONBY OF LECKONBY HOUSE.

John Leckonby, the earliest of the name we find mentioned as connected with Great Eccleston, on the borders of which stood Leckonby House, was living in 1621, and was twice married—first to Alice, the daughter of Thomas Singleton, of Staining Hall, and subsequently, in 1625, to Marie, the daughter of Henry Preston, of Preston. Richard Leckonby, the eldest son and heir, was the offspring of his first marriage, and like his father, became involved in the civil wars on the royal side. Richard succeeded to the family estates sometime before 1646, for in that year he compounded for them with Parliament. He left issue at his death in 1669, by his wife, Isabel, a numerous family—John; Richard, of Elswick; George; William, of Elswick; Sarah; Martha; and Mary, who married Gilbert Whiteside, of Marton, gentleman. John Leckonby inherited the estate, and resided at the ancestral mansion—Leckonby House. He married Ann, the daughter of William Thompson, gent., of Little Eccleston, but dying without offspring, was succeeded by his brother Richard, who had espoused Ann, the daughter of William Hesketh, of Mains Hall. The children of Richard Leckonby, of Leckonby House, were William; Richard, who was born in 1696, and afterwards became a Romish missionary; and Thomas, also a missionary, who died at Maryland in 1734. William Leckonby, the eldest son, occupied Leckonby House, after the decease of his father, as holder of the hereditary estates. He espoused Anne, the daughter of Thomas Hothersall, of Hothersall Hall, and sister and co-heiress of John Hothersall, and had issue—Richard; Thomas, born in 1717, who entered the Order of Jesus; William, of Elswick, who died in 1784; Anne, born in 1706; Bridget; and Mary, who became the wife of Thomas Singleton, of Barnacre-with-Bonds, gent. Richard Leckonby, who succeeded his father in 1728, inherited, in addition to the lands in Great Eccleston and Elswick, the extensive manor of Hothersall, and by his marriage with Mary, the daughter of William Hawthornthwaite, of Catshaw, gent., came into possession, on the death of her brother John Hawthornthwaite in 1760, of Catshaw, Lower Wyersdale, Hale, Luddocks, and Stockenbridge. Notwithstanding these large accessions to the original family domain, Richard Leckonby managed, by a long career of dissipation and extravagance, to run through his resources, mortgaging his estates, and bringing himself and his family to comparative poverty. He died in 1783, at about 68 years of age, having survived his wife many years, and was buried at St. Michael’s-on-Wyre. His offspring were two sons, the elder of whom was thrown from a pony and killed in early youth; whilst the second, William, met with a fatal accident when hunting in Wyersdale the year before the death of his father. William Leckonby, left, at his untimely death, by his wife, Elizabeth, the daughter of James Taylor, of Goosnargh, gent., two sons and a daughter. Of these children, Richard, the eldest, died in 1795, when only sixteen years of age; James, the second son, died in infancy; and Mary, their sister, married in 1799, at the age of twenty-two years, Thomas Henry Hale Phipps, of Leighton House, Wiltshire, a justice of the peace and deputy-lieutenant of his county, by which union, Leckonby of Leckonby House, became a title of the past.

LEYLAND OF LEYLAND HOUSE AND KELLAMERGH.

Leyland House was occupied during the latter half of the seventeenth and part of the eighteenth centuries by a family of wealth and position, named the Leylands of Kellamergh. Christopher Leyland, the first of the line recorded, resided at Leyland House in 1660, and married in 1665, Margaret Andrew, of Lea, by whom he had issue—John; Ralph, died in 1675; Anne, born 1671; Ellen, born 1679; Susan, died 1670; another Ralph, born 1680 and died 1711; Francis, died 1674; Bridget, died 1687; Roger, died 1678; and Thomas, who died in 1682.

John Leyland, who succeeded to the Kellamergh property and Leyland House on the death of his father in 1716, married, in 1693, Elizabeth Whitehead, and had offspring—Christopher, born 1694; Thomas, born 1699, afterwards in holy orders; Joseph, died 1709; Ralph, born 1712; John, died 1716; and William, who espoused Cicely, widow of Edward Rigby, of Freckleton, and daughter of Thomas Shepherd Birley, by whom he had two daughters, one of whom, Jane Leyland, subsequently married Thomas Langton.

Christopher Leyland inherited Kellamergh and the mansion on the demise of his father, John Leyland, in 1745, and at his own death, some years later, left one child, Elizabeth, who married, as her second husband, the Rev. Edward Whitehead, vicar of Bolton.

LONGWORTH OF ST. MICHAEL’S HALL.

The family of Longworths, inhabiting St. Michael’s Hall until the early part of the eighteenth century, was descended from the Longworths, of Longworth, through Ralph, a younger son of Christopher Longworth, of Longworth, by his wife Alice, the daughter of Thomas Standish, of Duxbury. Ralph Longworth married Anne, the daughter of Thomas Kitchen, and had issue two sons and one daughter. Robert, the younger son, espoused Helen Hudson, whilst Elizabeth, his sister, married Richard Blackburne, and afterwards Thomas Bell, of Kirkland. Richard, the elder son and heir, is the first of the Longworths, described as of St. Michael’s Hall, in Upper Rawcliffe. He married Margaret, the daughter of George Cumming, of Upper Rawcliffe, and had issue—Ralph, Thomas, Lawrence, Christopher, Anne, Elizabeth, and Katherine. Ralph, the eldest son, espoused Jane, the daughter of Richard Cross, of Cross Hall, in Chorley parish, but further than this fact, we have no information concerning him. The family of the Crosses, into which he married, belonged to Liverpool, and their old country seat, Cross Hall, is now converted into cottages and workshops. Thomas Longworth, the second son, born in 1622, resided at St. Michael’s Hall, and married Cicely, the daughter of Nicholas Wilkinson, of Kirkland, by whom he had one son—Richard Longworth. The latter representative, having succeeded in course of time to the Hall and estates, was a justice of the peace for the county of Lancaster, and on terms of intimacy with Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, Edward Veale, of Whinney Heys, William Hesketh, of Mains Hall, and a number of other leading gentry in the district. He married Fleetwood, the daughter of Edward Shutteworth, of Larbrick, and Thornton Hall, and left at his demise one son—Edward Longworth, who became a doctor of medicine, and resided at St. Michael’s Hall until 1725, about which time he removed to Penrith, in the county of Cumberland.

PARKER OF BRADKIRK HALL.

The Parkers, who inhabited Bradkirk Hall for over a hundred years, were relatives of the Derby family, and came originally from Breightmet Hall, near Bolton, where they had lived for many centuries. William Parker, of Bradkirk Hall, who died in 1609, and was buried at Kirkham, is the first of whom we have any authentic account, and he is stated to have married Margaret, the daughter of Robert Shaw, of Crompton. The children springing from that union were—John, who inherited Bradkirk Hall; Thomas, of Bidstone, in the county of Chester; and Henry, who espoused, in 1609, Alice Threlfall, and became the founder of the family of Parkers of Whittingham. John Parker, of Bradkirk Hall, married Margaret, the daughter and co-heiress of Anthony Parker, of Radham Park, Yorkshire; and after her decease he espoused Alice, the daughter of Richard Mason, of Up-Holland, near Wigan, by whom he had three sons and one daughter—William, Richard, John, and Margaret. The offspring of his first marriage were Anthony, Elizabeth, Jennet, Anne, Alice, and Christopher. Anthony died unmarried, and Christopher, the second son, born in 1625, succeeded to Bradkirk Hall on the demise of his father. He was a justice of the peace for the county of Lancaster, and married Katherine, sister to James Lowde, of Kirkham, and daughter of Ralph Lowde, of Norfolk. His children were Anthony; Alexander, who married Dorothy, the daughter of Thomas Westby, of Mowbreck; John, William, Gerrard, Christopher, Margaret, Mary, and Jane, the last married John Westby, of Mowbreck, at Poulton church, in 1688. Anthony Parker, the eldest son, born in 1657, lived at Bradkirk Hall, and espoused Mary, the daughter of Sir Thomas Stringer, sergeant-at-law, by whom he had issue—Christopher, Catherine, and Rebecca, who died young. Christopher Parker inherited Bradkirk Hall, and was Member of Parliament for Clitheroe in 1708. He died unmarried about 1713, and the Hall and estates passed by will to his sister Catherine, the wife of Thomas Stanley, of Cross Hall, in Ormskirk Parish, conjointly with her uncle Alexander Parker. In 1723 the possessions of the deceased Christopher Parker in Lancashire and Yorkshire were sold by Catherine Stanley and Alexander Parker. The latter, however, resided at Bradkirk Hall for some time after that date with his wife Dorothy, the daughter, as before stated, of Thomas Westby of Mowbreck, by whom he had nine sons and two daughters. The sons appear to have died without issue, and one of the daughters, Dorothy, married ⸺ Cowburn, whilst the other Katherine, became the wife of William Jump, of Hesketh Bank.

RIGBY OF LAYTON HALL.

The Rigbys, of Layton, were descended from Adam Rigby, of Wigan, who married Alice, the daughter of ⸺ Middleton, of Leighton, and had issue—John, Alexander, and Ellen. John Rigby, of Wigan, married Joanna, the daughter of Gilbert Molyneux, of Hawkley, and became the founder of the family of Rigby of Middleton. Ellen became the wife of Hugh Forth; and Alexander Rigby, of Burgh Hall, in the township of Duxbury, espoused Joanna, the daughter of William Lathbroke, by whom he had three sons and one daughter—Edward, Roger, Alexander, and Anne. Edward Rigby, of Burgh, who purchased the estate of Woodenshaw from William, earl of Derby, in 1595, was the first of the family, as far as can be ascertained, who held property in the Fylde, and from his Inq. post mortem, dated 1629-30, we find that he possessed Laiton, Great Laiton, Little Laiton, Warbrecke, Blackepool, and Marton, besides other estates in Broughton in Furness, Lancaster, Chorley, etc. This gentleman married Dorothy, the daughter of Hugh Anderton, of Euxton, and had issue—Alexander, Hugh, Alice, Jane, and Dorothy. Alexander Rigby, who was born in 1583, succeeded to Layton Hall, and Burgh, on the death of his father, and afterwards married Katherine, the daughter of Sir Edward Brabazon, of Nether Whitacre, in the county of Warwick. In 1641, during the time of Charles I., he was a colonel in the king’s forces, and was, somewhere about that period, removed from the commission of the peace for this county by command of Parliament on account of certain charges made against him of favouring the royal party. In 1646 he compounded for his sequestrated estates by paying £381 3s. 4d. His offspring were Edward, of Burgh, and Layton Hall; Thomas, rector of St. Mary’s, Dublin; William, a merchant; Mary, wife of John Moore, of Bank Hall; Elizabeth, wife of Edward Chisenhall, of Chisenhall; Jane, the wife of the Rev. Paul Lathome, rector of Standish; and Alexander, who died in infancy. Edward, the eldest son, who died before his father, married Mary, the daughter of Edward Hyde, of Norbury, and left issue—Alexander, William, Hamlet, Robert, Richard, Mary, and Dorothy. Alexander Rigby, the heir, who was born in 1634, was also an officer in the royalist army, and erected a monument to Sir Thomas Tyldesley near the spot where he was slain at Wigan-lane, at which battle “the grateful erector” fought as cornet. He was High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1677 and 1678, and married Alena, the daughter of George Birch, of Birch Hall, near Manchester. His children were Edward, Alexander, Mary, Alice, Eleanor, and Elizabeth. Of Edward we have no account beyond the fact that he was born in 1658, and consequently must conclude that he died young. Alexander, the second son, succeeded to the estates, and was knighted for some reason, which cannot be discovered. He was High Sheriff of the county in 1691-2. Mary, the eldest daughter, married Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, and was co-heiress with Elizabeth, wife, and subsequently, in 1720, widow of ⸺ Colley, to her brother, Sir Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall and Burgh, who married Alice, the daughter of Thomas Clifton, of Clifton, Westby, and Lytham, but left no surviving offspring. Sir Alexander Rigby is reputed to have been a gambler, and to have so impoverished his estates, already seriously injured by the attachment of his family to the fortunes of Charles I. and II., that he was compelled to dispose of his possessions in Poulton and Layton for the benefit of his creditors. He also appears to have been imprisoned for debt until released by an act of Parliament, passed in the first year of George I., and his property vested in trustees. His estates in Layton and Poulton were sold for £19,200. After his liberation he resided in Poulton at his house on the south side of the Market-place, where the family arms, bearing the date 1693, may still be seen fixed on the outer wall. The pew of the Rigbys is still in existence in the parish church of that town, and has carved on its door the initials A. R., and the date 1636, separated by a goat’s head, the crest of the family.

SINGLETON OF STAINING HALL.

There is every reason to suppose that the Singletons who resided at Staining Hall during the greater part of two centuries were a branch of the family founded in the Fylde by Alan de Singleton, of Singleton. George, the son of Robert Singleton by his wife Helen, the daughter of John Westby, of Mowbreck, purchased the hamlet and manor of Staining from Sir Thomas Holt, of Grislehurst, and was the first of the name to occupy the Hall. He married Mary Osbaldeston, and left issue at his death, in 1552, William, the eldest; Hugh, who espoused Mary, sister of William Carleton, of Carleton, and left a son, William, who died without issue; Richard; Lawrence; and Margaret, the wife of Lawrence Carleton, heir and subsequently successor to his brother William. William Singleton, of Staining, became allied to Alice, the daughter and heiress of Thomas ffarington, by whom he had Thomas, John, George, Richard, Helen, and Margaret. On the demise of his father in 1556, Thomas, the heir, came into possession of the estate; he married Alice, the daughter of James Massey, and had one child, a daughter, Ellen, who espoused John Massey, of Layton. Thomas Singleton died in 1563, and was succeeded by his brother John, who had married Thomasine, the daughter of Robert Anderton, and had issue two daughters, the elder of whom, Alice, became the wife of Henry Huxley, of Birkenhead, and the younger, Elizabeth, of James Massey, of Strangeways. John Singleton died in 1590, and was in his turn succeeded by the next male representative, his brother George, who had issue by his wife Mary, the daughter of John Houghton, of Penwortham or Pendleton, two sons and a daughter—Thomas, George, and Anne, the wife of Robert Parkinson, of Fairsnape. Thomas Singleton, the heir, became lord of Staining in 1597, previously to which he had espoused Cicely, the daughter of William Gerard, of Ince, and had issue Thomas, John, Mary, Grace, Alice, the last of whom married John Leckonby, of Great Eccleston, and Anne, the wife of Richard Bamber, of the Moor, near Poulton. Thomas Singleton, the eldest son, succeeded to the lordship in the natural course of events, and formed an alliance with Dorothy, the daughter of James Anderton, of Clayton, who was left a widow in 1643, when her husband was slain at Newbury Fight in command of a company of royalists. The offspring of Thomas and Dorothy Singleton were John, born in 1635 and died in 1668, who espoused Jane, the daughter of Edmund Fleetwood, of Rossall; Thomas, who died childless; George; James; Anne, of Bardsea, a spinster, living in 1690; Mary, the wife of John Mayfield; and Dorothy, the wife of Alexander Butler, of Todderstaff Hall. John Singleton, of Staining, whose widow married Thomas Cole, of Beaumont, near Lancaster, justice of the peace, and deputy-lieutenant, had no progeny, and the manor passed, either at once, or after the death of the next brother, Thomas, to George Singleton, who had possession in 1679, but was dead in 1690, never having been married. He held Staining, Hardhorne, Todderstaff, and Carleton manors or estates. The whole of the property descended to John Mayfield, the son and heir of his sister Mary, whose husband, John Mayfield, was dead. John Mayfield, of Staining, etc., ultimately died without issue, and was succeeded by his nephew and heir-at-law, William Blackburn, of Great Eccleston, whose offspring were James, and Gabriel, under age in 1755.

STANLEY OF GREAT ECCLESTON HALL.

The Stanleys, of Great Eccleston, were descended from Henry, the fourth earl of Derby, who was born in 1531, through Thomas Stanley, one of his illegitimate children by Jane Halsall, of Knowsley, the others being Dorothy and Ursula. Thomas Stanley settled at Great Eccleston Hall, probably acquired by purchase, and married Mary, the relict of Richard Barton, of Barton, near Preston, and the daughter of Robert Hesketh, of Rufford. The offspring of that union were—Richard Stanley; Fernando Stanley, of Broughton, who died unmarried in 1664; and Jane Stanley, who was married to Henry Butler, of Rawcliffe Hall. Richard Stanley, the eldest son, succeeded to Great Eccleston Hall and estate on the death of his father, and espoused Mary, the daughter and sole heiress of Lambert Tyldesley, of Garret, by whom he had one son, Thomas Stanley, who in course of time inherited the Eccleston property, and married Frances, the daughter of Major-General Sir Thomas Tyldesley, of Tyldesley and Myerscough Lodge, the famous royalist officer slain at the battle of Wigan-lane in 1651. Richard Stanley, the only child of this marriage, resided at Great Eccleston Hall, and espoused Anne, the daughter and eventually co-heiress of Thomas Culcheth, of Culcheth, by whom he had two sons—Thomas and Henry Stanley. Richard Stanley, who died in 1714, was buried at St. Michael’s church, and the following extract is taken from the diary of Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, the grandson of Sir Thomas Tyldesley, and consequently Richard Stanley’s cousin, who at that time appears to have been in failing health, and whose death occurred on the 26th of January in the ensuing year:—

“October 16, 1714.—Wentt in ye morning to the ffuneral off Dick Stanley. Partᵈ with Mr. Brandon att Dick Jackson’s dor; but fell at Staven’s Poole; and soe wentt home.”

It may here be mentioned that for two years the cousins had not been on very friendly terms, owing to Richard Stanley having at a meeting of creditors, summoned by Thomas Tyldesley in 1712, when he had fallen too deeply into debt, objected to an allowance being made to Winefride and Agatha, daughters of Thomas Tyldesley by a second marriage. We may form some idea of the strong feeling existing between them from an entry made on the 7th of May, 1712, by Thomas Tyldesley in his diary:—“Stanley—Dicke—very bitter against my two poor girlles, and declared he would bee hanged beffor they had one penny allowed; yet my honest and never-to-be-forgotten true friend Winckley, with much art and sence, soe perswaded the otheʳ refferys that the slaving puppy was compelled to consent to a small allowance to be sedulled—viz.: £100 each.” After the decease of Richard Stanley, Great Eccleston Hall, for some reason we are unable to explain, passed into the possession of Thomas Westby, of Upper Rawcliffe.

TYLDESLEY OF FOX HALL.

The family which inhabited the ancient mansion of Fox Hall in the time of Charles II., and for many subsequent years, sprang originally from the small village of Tyldesley, near Bolton-le-moors. When or how they first became associated with the latter place is impossible to determine, as no authentic documents bearing on the subject can be discovered; but that they must have been established in or connected with the neighbourhood at an early epoch is shown by the fact that Henry de Tyldesley held the tenth part of a Knight’s fee in Tyldesley during the reign of Edward I., 1272-1307. A Richard de Tyldesley was lord of the manor of Tyldesley towards the close of the sovereignty of this monarch, and there is sufficient evidence to warrant the assumption that he was the son and heir of Henry de Tyldesley.

At a later period Thurstan de Tyldesley, a lineal descendant, who is accredited with having done much to improve his native village, and having built Wardley Hall, near Manchester, about 1547, was a justice of the peace for the county of Lancaster, and Receiver-General for the Isle of Man in 1532. He was on intimate and friendly terms with the earl of Derby, and we may safely conjecture that the members of the two houses had for long been familiarly known to each other, as we read that in 1405 Henry IV. granted a letter of protection to William de Stanley, knt., John de Tyldesley, and several more, when they set out to take possession of the Isle of Man and Peel Castle. In 1417, when Sir John de Stanley, lord of the same island, was summoned to England, he left Thurston de Tyldesley, a magistrate, to officiate as governor during his absence. The Tyldesleys held extensive lands in Wardley, Morleys, Myerscough, and Tyldesley, having seats at the three first-named manors. Thurstan de Tyldesley, who erected Wardley Hall, was twice married and had issue by each wife. To the offspring of the first, Parnell, daughter of Geoffrey Shakerley, of Shakerley, he left Tyldesley and Wardley; and to those of his second, Jane, daughter of Ralph Langton, baron of Newton, he bequeathed Myerscough, and some minor property. There is nothing calling for special notice concerning any, except two, of the descendants from the first marriage—Sir Thomas Tyldesley, a great-grandson, attorney-general for Lancashire in the reign of James I.; and his son, who did not survive him many months, and terminated the elder branch. In consequence of this failure of issue the Tyldesley estate, but not Wardley, which had been sold, passed to the representatives of Thurstan’s children by his second wife. The eldest son of the second alliance, Edward, had espoused Anne, the daughter and heiress of Thomas Leyland, of Morleys, and, subsequently, inherited the manor and Hall of Morleys. The grandson and namesake of Edward Tyldesley, of Morleys and Tyldesley, who was born in 1585, and died in 1618, entertained James I. for three days at his seat, Myerscough Lodge, in 1617. Edward Tyldesley, of Myerscough, was the father of Major-General Sir Thomas Tyldesley, knt., who so greatly distinguished himself, by his fidelity and valour, in the wars between King and Parliament. In those sanguinary and calamitous struggles he served under the standard of royalty. He was slain at the battle of Wigan-lane in 1651; and as a mark of esteem for his many virtues and gallant deeds a monument was erected, near the spot where he fell, in 1679, by Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall, High Sheriff for the county of Lancaster. The monument was inscribed as under:—

“An high Act of Gratitude, which conveys the Memory of
SIR THOMAS TYLDESLEY
To posterity,
Who served King Charles the First as Lieutenant-Colonel at Edge-Hill Battle,
After raising regiments of Horse, Foot, and Dragoons,
and for
The desperate storming of Burton on Trent, over a bridge of 36 arches,
Received the Honour of Knighthood.
He afterwards served in all the wars in great command,
Was Governor of Litchfield,
And followed the fortune of the Crown through the Three Kingdoms,
And never compounded with the Rebels though strongly invested;
And on the 25th of August, A.D. 1651, was here slain,
Commanding as Major-General under the Earl of Derby,
To whom the grateful erector, Alexander Rigby, Esq., was Cornet;
And when he was High Sheriff of this county, A.D. 1679,
Placed the high obligation on the whole Family of the Tyldesleys,
To follow the noble example of their Loyal Ancestor.”

Sir Thomas Tyldesley married Frances, daughter of Ralph Standish, of Standish, and had issue—Edward, born in 1635; Thomas, born in 1642; Ralph, born in 1644; Bridget, who became the wife of Henry Blundell, of Ince Blundell; Elizabeth; Frances, wife of Thomas Stanley, of Great Eccleston; Anne, who was abbess of the English nuns at Paris in 1721; Dorothy; Mary, wife of Richard Crane; and Margaret.

Edward Tyldesley, the eldest son and heir, followed in the footsteps of his father, and was a staunch supporter of Charles II. When that monarch had been restored to the throne of his ancestors he purposed creating a fresh order of Knighthood, called the Royal Oak,[62] wherewith to reward a number of his faithful adherents, whose social positions were of sufficient standing to render them suitable recipients of the honour. Edward Tyldesley was amongst those selected; but the design was abandoned by the king under the advice of his ministers, who considered that it was likely to produce jealousy and dissatisfaction in many quarters, and might prove inimical to the peace of the nation. Under an impression, which afterwards proved erroneous, that Charles II. intended to confer upon him the lands of Layton Hawes, in recognition of the loyal services of his father and himself, Edward Tyldesley erected a residence, called Fox Hall, near its borders, where he lived during certain portions of the year until his death, which occurred between 1685 and 1687. Edward Tyldesley espoused Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Fleetwood, of Colwich, in Staffordshire, and baron of Newton, in Lancashire; and after her decease, Elizabeth, daughter of Adam Beaumont, of Whitley, by whom he had only one child, Catherine Tyldesley, of Preston. The offspring of his union with Anne Fleetwood were Thomas, Edward, Frances, and Maria. Thomas Tyldesley succeeded to the estates, on the decease of his father, with the exception of Tyldesley, which had been sold by Edward Tyldesley in 1685, and resided during a considerable part of his life at Fox Hall, and occasionally at Myerscough Lodge. Thomas Tyldesley was born in 1657, and at twenty-two years of age married Eleanor, daughter and co-heiress of Thomas Holcroft, of Holcroft, by whom he had Edward, Dorothy, Frances, Elizabeth, Eleanor, and Mary. After the death of his wife Eleanor, Thomas Tyldesley espoused Mary, sister and co-heiress of Sir Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall, and had issue—Charles, Fleetwood, James, Agatha, and Winefrid. Thomas Tyldesley, whilst living at Fox Hall, employed his time chiefly in field sports, visits amongst the neighbouring gentry, and frequent excursions to his more distant friends, as we learn from his diary, a portion of which is still preserved. The following extracts from it will illustrate what formed the favourite recreations of the numerous well-to-do families peopling the Fylde at that era:—

“May 16, 1712.—In the morning went round the commone a ffowling, and Franke Malley, Jo. Hull, and Ned Malley, shoot 12 times for one poor twewittee; came home; after dinner Cos. W: W: went with me to Thornton Marsh, where we had but bad suckses; tho wee killed ffive or six head of ffowle.

“May 31, 1712.—Went to yᵉ Hays to see a race between Mr. Harper’s mare and Sanderson’s; meet a greatt deal of good company, but spent noe thing.

“June 7, 1712.—Pd. Mrs. 2s. 6d., pd. pro ffish 1s., pro meat 3s.; and affter dinʳ went with cos Walton to bowle with old Beamont. I spent 10d. att bowling green house with 4 grubcatchers and Tom Walton, and Jo. Styeth.

“June 10, 1713.—Gave Joⁿ Malley and Jo. Parkinson 1s. to see yᵉ cock ffeights. Gave Ned Malley 1s. for subsistence. Dinᵈ in the cockpitt with Mr. Clifton and others. Spent in wine 6d., and pro dinʳ 1s. Gave yᵉ fidler 6d. Spent in the pitt betwixt battles 6d.; I won near 30s.

“June 17, 1713.—Al day in yᵉ house and gardening; went to beed about 7, and riss at 10, in ordʳ to goe a ffox hunting.

“Augᵗ 29, 1713.—Paid 2s. pro servant, &c.; soe a otter hunting to Wire, but killed none.

“Septʳ 5, 1713.—In the morning Jos. Tounson and I went to Staining; ... thence to Layton-heys to see a foot race, where I won 6d. off Jos. Tounson—white against dun; soe home. Gave white my winings.

“Octʳ 6, 1713.—We hunted yᵗᵗ hare ffive hours; but yᵉ ground soe thorrowly drughted by long continewance of ffine wether that we could not kill her.

“Decʳ 16, 1713.—In the morning went a coursing with Sʳ W: G:; Lawʳ Rigby, &c.

“March 16, 1714.—In the morning sent Dick Gorney and 6 more harty lads a ffishing; I stopᵈ with a showʳ of raine. Two of Rob. Rich his sons came in on my godson, to whom I gave 1s.; thence followed the ffishʳˢ, where we had very good sport, and tuck 8 brave large growen tenches, and 6 as noble carps as I have seen tuke, severall pearch, some gudgeons, and a large eyell, and 6 great chevens.”

The diarist, Thomas Tyldesley, died in 1715, before the outbreak of the rebellion, and was buried at Churchtown, near Garstang. Edward Tyldesley, his eldest son, who succeeded him, had two children by his wife Dorothy—James and Catherine. He was accused, tried, and acquitted of taking part with the rebels of 1715, although the evidence clearly convicted him of having led a body of men against the king’s forces. At the death of Edward Tyldesley, in 1725, Myerscough no longer belonged to the family, but Holcroft, acquired by marriage in 1679, passed to his son James, who twenty years later served with the troops of Prince Charles, the younger pretender, and died in 1765. The offspring of James Tyldesley by Sarah, his wife, were Thomas, Charles, James, Henry, and Jane, all of whom with their descendants seem to have sold or mortgaged the remnants of the once large estates, and gradually drifted into poverty and obscurity.

It will not be out of place in concluding the notice of a family connected with the earliest infancy of Blackpool, to state something of the character and habits of Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, as disclosed by, and deduced from, the entries in his diary, which unfortunately comprises only the last three years of his life. At the present time the appearance of a party of gentlemen in this neighbourhood decorated with curled wigs, surmounted by three-cornered hats, and habited in long-figured waistcoats, plush breeches, and red-heeled boots, would excite no little astonishment, yet in the days of the diarist the sight must have been one of usual occurrence, for such was the style of costume worn by the wealthier classes. The lower classes were clothed in garments made from the undyed wool of the sheep and called hodden gray.

Thomas Tyldesley was a great equestrian, his journeys being so frequent and rapid that it is difficult to be certain of his whereabouts when he finished his day’s work and its minute record, with the final “soe to beed.” He was on terms of intimacy and friendship with the Rigbys of Layton, the Veales of Whinney Heys, the Westbys of Burn Hall, and all the wealthy families in the neighbourhood. Fishing, hunting, coursing, and shooting were his favourite recreations. Nor was he unmindful in the midst of these amusements of the interests of his farm, as the accompanying remarks amply testify:—“Very bussy all morning in my hay;” and “Alday in the house and my garden, bussy transplanting colleflowʳ and cabage plants;” whilst at other times we find him in communication with various tenants relative to some portion or other of the Myerscough property. Unless confined to bed by gout or rheumatism, and the self-imposed, but fearful, “Phissickings” he underwent, swallowing doses whose magnitude alone would appal most men of modern days, he was ever actively engaged in either business or pleasure. Every item of disbursement and every circumstance that occurred, even to the most trivial, has found a place in his diary, and from it we learn that while evidently anxious to avoid unnecessary expenditure, he was neither parsimonious nor illiberal, always recompensing those who had been put to any trouble on his account, and paying his share of each friendly gathering with a scrupulous exactness. There is, however, a satisfaction expressed in the words, “but spent noe thing,” after the brief notice of the horse-race he had attended on the Hawes, which, when we call to mind his natural generosity, showed that his income required care in its expenditure, and was barely sufficient to support the position he held by birth. Many other entries in his diary prove that he was frequently short of money, and as his mode of living appears to have been far from extravagant, it seems difficult at first sight to account for the circumstance. But when we discover that he had for years been connected, as one of the leading members and promoters, with a Catholic and Jacobite Society at Walton-le-dale, having for its object the restoration of the Stuarts, then in exile, and remember that a scheme of such magnitude and importance could not possibly be matured or kept in activity without the purses of its more earnest supporters suffering to a great extent, we obtain in some measure an explanation of the matter.

The character of Thomas Tyldesley, as gleaned from his diary, may be summarised as follows:—He was in every sense a country gentleman, fond of field sports, happy on his farm, thoughtful of the condition and comfort of his cattle, although sometimes given to hard, or at least far, riding; for the rest, he was active and intelligent, liberal to his dependants, careful in his household, and strictly honourable in all his dealings, but above all he had an earnest and deep reverence for his creed and principles that spared no sacrifice.

VEALE OF WHINNEY HEYS.

The Veales, of Whinney Heys, who during a time of considerable license and extravagance, were renowned for their piety and frugality, were descended from John Veale, of Mythorp. This gentleman was living during the reign of Elizabeth, and furnished 1 caliver and 1 morion at the military muster which took place in 1574. Francis Veale, the son of John Veale, of Mythorp, is the first of the name we find described as of Whinney Heys.[63] Francis Veale left a son, Edward, who resided at Whinney Heys, and appeared amongst the list of Free-tenants of Amounderness in 1621. According to Sir William Dugdale, he was a justice of the peace for Lancashire in the reigns of James I. and Charles I. Edward Veale married Ellen, the daughter and co-heiress, with her younger sister Alice, of John Massey, of Layton and Carleton, and in that way the Veales acquired much of their property in the neighbourhood of Whinney Heys. The offspring of this union were—John, who was born in 1605; Massey; Edward; Francis; Singleton; Ellen, who married Thomas Heardson, of Cambridge; Juliana; Dorothy, who married George Sharples, of Freckleton; Anne, who became the wife of John Austin, of London; Alice; and Frances, the wife of William Wombwell, of London. The maiden name of Mrs. Edward Veale’s mother was Singleton, she being the daughter of Thomas Singleton, of Staining Hall, and for that reason we find the name borne by one of the sons of Edward Veale. John Veale, the eldest son, succeeded to the Hall and estate, and espoused Dorothy, the daughter of Matthew Jepson, of Hawkswell, in Yorkshire. John Veale was fifty-nine years of age in 1664, and at that date entered the names of his ancestors, etc., before Sir William Dugdale at Preston, who was on his heraldic visitation in Lancashire. The children of John Veale, by Dorothy, his wife, were—John, Edward, Helen, Susan, and Jane. John Veale, who was twenty years old in 1664, became the representative of the family on the decease of his father, some time previous to which he had married Susannah, the daughter of Geoffrey Rishton, of Antley, and by her had issue—Edward, born in 1680; Ellen, the wife of Richard Sherdley, of Kirkham, born in 1698; and Dorothy, who died unmarried in 1747, aged 76 years. John Veale was a justice of the peace for this county, and died in 1704. After the death of John Veale, whose remains were interred at Bispham church, Edward, his only son, inherited the lands and Hall of Whinney Heys. Edward Veale was living at the same time as Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, Blackpool, and between the two gentlemen a close friendship seems to have existed, as we glean from the diary of the latter, in which Edward Veale is frequently mentioned, being invariably, for some reason, styled Captain,—perhaps he once held that rank in some temporary or reserve force, for there is no record of his ever having been connected with the regular troops. The following is a short extract from the above diary in 1712:—

“Aug. 2.—Att my returne I wentt to yᵉ King’s Arms, and got my dinʳ with Broʳ. We spent 1s. a pice in whitte wine, and as wee went through yᵉ hall met with Just. Longworth,[64] Capᵗᵗ Veale, Just. Pearson, Franke Nickinson, and small Lᵈ of Roshall.[65] Wee were very merry upon yᵉ small Lord, and spent 1s. a pice in sack and white wine, wʰ elevated yᵉ petite Lᵈ that before he went to bed he tucke yᵉ ffriedom of biting his man Sharocke’s thumb off just beyond yᵉ nail. I found cos. W: W: att home.”

Edward left issue at his death in 1723, at forty-three years of age—John, Sarah, and Susannah. John Veale, the heir, entered into holy orders, and subsequently died unmarried. Sarah and Susannah Veale, the co-heiresses of their brother, married respectively Edward Fleetwood, of Rossall Hall (the small lord), and John Fayle, of the Holmes, Thornton, who erected Bridge House in Bispham, after the model of the original Hall of Whinney Heys. The lands and residence of Whinney Heys eventually passed into the possession of the Fleetwoods, of Rossall, through the wife of Edward Fleetwood. The Veales were Puritans in religion, and one of the family, named Edward Veale, whose father was the third son of Edward and Ellen Veale mentioned above, and a lay member of the Presbyterian Classis for this district in the time of the Commonwealth, attained considerable eminence, first as a Puritan preacher and afterwards as a Nonconformist minister. Calamy, in his Nonconformist Memorial, tells us that “Mr. Edward Veale, of Christ Church, Oxford, afterwards of Trinity College, Dublin, was ordained at Winwick in Lancashire, August 4th, 1657. When he left Ireland he brought with him a testimonial of his being ‘a learned, orthodox minister, of a sober, pious, and peaceable conversation, who during his abode at the college was eminently useful for the instruction of youth, and whose ministry had been often exercised in and about the city of Dublin with great satisfaction to the godly, until he was deprived of his fellowship for nonconformity to the ceremonies imposed in the church, and for joining with other ministers in their endeavours for a reformation;’ signed by Richard Charnock and six other respectable ministers. He became chaplain to Sir William Waller, in Middlesex, and afterwards settled as a Nonconformist pastor in Wapping, where he lived to a good old age. He had several pupils, to whom he read university learning, who were afterwards useful persons; one of whom was Mr. Nathaniel Taylor. He died June 6th, 1708, aged 76. His funeral sermon was preached by Mr. T. Symonds, who succeeded him.”

WESTBY OF MOWBRECK HALL AND BURN HALL.[66]

The family of this name, so long associated with the township of Medlar-with-Wesham, in the parish of Kirkham, is descended from the Westbys of Westby, in the county of York.

William Westby, who was under-sheriff of Lancashire in 1345, is the first of the name, we can find, residing at Mowbreck; and a great-grandson of his, named William Westby, is recorded as inheriting the Mowbreck and Westby property in the reign of Henry VI., 1422-61. John Westby, the son of the latter William, succeeded to the estates, residing, like his ancestors, at Mowbreck Hall, and was twice married, the offspring of the first union, with Mabill, daughter of Richard Botiler, being two daughters; and of the second, with Eleanor Kirkby, of Rawcliffe, a son and heir, named William, who succeeded him at his death in 1512. William Westby, although the lawful holder of the estates, did not obtain control over them until after 1517, being a minor at that date. He married Elizabeth Rigmayden, of Wedacer, and had issue—John, Elizabeth, and Helen. John Westby, the heir, had possession of Mowbreck, and Burn in Thornton township, about the year 1556, after the decease of his father; his places of residence were Mowbreck and Burn Halls. He was thrice married, and by his last wife, Ann, daughter of Sir Richard Molyneux, of Sefton and Larbrick, and widow of Thomas Dalton, of Thurnham, had issue—John, Thomas, William, Ellen, and Mary. John Westby succeeded his father in 1591, and dying unmarried in 1604, was in his turn succeeded by his brother, Thomas Westby, who was twice married, and purchased the estate of Whitehall, where the children of his second union established themselves. The offspring of his first wife, Perpetua, daughter of Edward Norris, of Speke, were—John, Thomas, Edward, William, Francis, Margaret, Perpetua, and Anne. John Westby, the heir, came into the Mowbreck estate and Burn Hall some time after 1622, but dying without issue in 1661, was succeeded by his nephew, Thomas, the eldest son of his fourth brother, Francis Westby, Thomas Westby, M.D., slain in the civil wars, and his two other brothers, Edward and William, having died childless. Thomas Westby, the inheritor of Westby, Mowbreck, and Burn, was born in 1641, and espoused Bridget, daughter of Thomas Clifton, of Lytham Hall, his issue being John, Thomas, William, Cuthbert, Robert, Francis, Bridget, Anne, and Dorothy. John Westby, the eldest son, inherited Westby, Mowbreck, and Burn Hall, on the demise of his father in 1700. Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, was intimate with this gentleman, as observed from the following entry in his diary in the year 1715:—

“June primo.—Went to Mains to prayers; thence with Jack Westby to Burn to dinner; stayed till 4; thence to Whinneyheys; stayed till 9; soe home.”

John Westby married, in 1688, Jane, daughter of Christopher Parker, of Bradkirk Hall, and had issue four daughters—Catherine, who married Alexander Osbaldeston, of Sunderland; Bridget, the wife of William Shuttleworth, of Turnover Hall; Mary, the wife of the Rev. Thomas Alderson; and Anne, the wife of the Rev. J. Bennison, of London. At the death of John Westby in 1722, Burn Hall and estate passed to the Bennisons, whilst Mowbreck became the property of Thomas Westby, who died childless six years later, and afterwards of Robert Westby, brothers of the deceased John Westby. Margaret Shuttleworth, the daughter of William and Bridget Shuttleworth, of Turnover, married her cousin, Thomas Westby, of Whitehall, in 1744, and had numerous offspring, the eldest of whom, John Westby, succeeded to Mowbreck, as heir-at-law, on the death of his relative, Robert Westby, before mentioned, in 1762. This John Westby died in 1811 unmarried, and was succeeded by his only surviving brother, Thomas Westby. This gentleman also died unmarried, and was succeeded in 1829 in the Turnover Hall estate, by his cousin, Thomas Westby, heir-at-law, to whose eldest son, George Westby, he left Whitehall and Mowbreck. George Westby espoused Mary Pauton, the eldest daughter of Major John Tate, of the 6th West Indian Infantry, and had issue—Mary Virginia Ann; Matilda Julia, wife of the Rev. Dr. Henry Hayman; Jocelyn Tate; Ada Perpetua; Georgina Blanche; Ashley George, late captain in the army; Cuthbert Menzies; Bernard Hægar, captain 16th regiment; Basil Clifton, captain 16th regiment. George Westby died at Paris in 1842, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Jocelyn Tate, the present holder, who took by royal license the name and arms of Fazakerley on espousing, in 1862, Matilda Harriette Gillibrand-Fazakerley sister and co-heiress of the late Henry Hawarden Gillibrand-Fazakerley, the son of Henry Hawarden Fazakerley, of Gillibrand Hall, etc., and lord of the manor of Chorley.

Jocelyn Tate Fazakerley-Westby, of Mowbreck Hall, esq., was formerly a cornet in the Scotch Greys, and is now a captain of Lancashire hussars, yeomanry cavalry. He is a justice of the peace and a deputy-lieutenant of the county of Lancaster.

CHAPTER VII.
PARISH OF POULTON-LE-FYLDE.

Poulton.

The ancient town and port of Poulton occupies the summit of a gentle ascent about one mile removed from the waters of Wyre at Skippool, and three from the Irish Sea at Blackpool. Between 1080 and ’86, Poltun, as it was written in the Norman Survey, contained no more than two carucates of land under tillage, or in an arable condition, so that out of the 900 acres composing the township, only 200 were cultivated by the inhabitants. A considerable proportion of the entire area of the township, however, would be covered with lofty trees, and provide excellent forage ground for large herds of swine, which formed the chief live-stock dealt in by our Anglo-Saxon and early Norman ancestors. Taking this into consideration, the comparatively small amount of soil devoted to agriculture, may not, indeed, indicate so meagre a population about the close of the eleventh century as otherwise it would seem to do, but still the evidence adduced is barely sufficient whereon to base the assumption that the antecedents of Poulton had been less under the destructive influence of the Danes than those of its neighbours. Regarding the locality more retrospectively, and turning back, for a brief space, to the era of the Romans, it must be admitted that nothing has as yet been discovered which could be construed into an intimation that the followers of Agricola, or their descendants, ever had a settlement or encampment on the site. It is true that the churchyard has yielded up many specimens of their ancient coinage, whilst others have been found at no great distance, but the character of the relics is in no way suggestive of a sojournment, like that of the fragmentary domestic utensils and urns of Kirkham; and when it is remembered that the much-used Roman road (Dane’s Pad) leading to the most important harbour of the west coast, passed through the vicinity on its way towards the Warren of Rossall, the explanation of the presence of the coins, as of other antiquities along its line, is obvious. The name of the town and district now under examination is of pure Anglo-Saxon origin, and acquired from its proximity to the pool of the Skipton, or Skippool, the signification of the word being, it is scarcely necessary to add, the enclosure or township of the pool. The date at which habitations first became visible on the soil must remain in a great measure a matter of conjecture, as the annals of history are silent respecting this and most other towns of Amounderness, until the arrival of William the Conqueror, but we may safely infer that it was not long after the advent of the Saxons before a situation so convenient both to the stream of Wyre and the frequented pathway just mentioned, attracted a small colony of settlers. Whatever century gave birth to Poulton, it is certain that from such epoch to 1066, the population would be constituted, almost exclusively, of the class known as “Villani,” perhaps most appropriately interpreted by our term villagers, and that the occupation of these bondsmen of the soil would be the tillage of the land and the superintendence of swine. Their huts were doubtless of very rude and primitive construction, but somewhere within the boundaries of the township there must have been a dwelling of more pretentious exterior, the residence of the Town-Reve, who received the dues and tolls from the “Villani,” on behalf of the large territorial lord, and exercised a general supervision over them. Athelstan appears to have held the lordship of the whole of Amounderness in 936, when he conveyed it to the See of York, and possibly before he ascended the throne it was invested successively in his regal predecessors.

After the Conquest, Poulton passed into the possession of the Norman nobleman, Roger de Poictou, by whom it was granted in 1094, to the priory of St. Mary, at Lancaster. “He gave,” says the charter, “Poltun in Agmundernesia, and whatsoever belonged to it, and the church with one carucate of land, and all other things belonging to it; moreover he gave the tithe of venison and of pawnage[67] in all the woods, and the tithe of his fishery.”[68] This extract proves beyond question the existence of a church at Poulton exactly eight years after the completion of the Domesday record; and further, that it was endowed with one carucate of land, or half the cultivated portion of the township. At the first glance it seems more probable that the sacred edifice was overlooked by the investigators in the course of the survey than that it was erected so shortly afterwards, but a study of other pages of the register betrays such evident care and minuteness on the part of those to whom the work of compilation was entrusted, that it appears impossible for an important building like the church to have escaped their notice. Roger de Poictou was justly celebrated for zeal in the cause of his faith; several monastic institutions owed their establishment to his liberality, and amongst them was St. Mary’s of Lancaster. It will therefore be but a reasonable conclusion to arrive at, that he built and endowed the parish church of Poulton with the intention of presenting it to the Priory of his own founding, in connection with the abbey of Sees in Normandy. During the reign of Richard I. (1189-99), Theobald Walter quitclaimed to the abbot of Sees all his right to the advowson of Poulton and the church of Bispham, owing to a suit instituted against him by that ecclesiastic;[69] and hence it must be inferred that the donation of Roger de Poictou had through some cause reverted to him, being subsequently conferred on Walter in company with other of the confiscated estates of the rebellious baron. The abbot of Cockersand also had some interest in the town about the time the last event took place, and in about 1216 he compounded with the prior of Lancaster for certain tithes held by him in the parish.[70] In 1246 the mediety of the church of Poulton and the chapel of Bispham was granted by the archdeacon of Richmond to the priory of St. Mary, and half a century later John Romanus, archdeacon of Richmond, confirmed the gift, bestowing on it in addition the remaining mediety, to be received when death had removed the present holder. A clause in the document stipulated that immediately the second mediety had been appropriated a vicar should be appointed at a salary of twenty marks (£13 6s. 8d.) per annum.[71] Here again it is clear that some time in the interval between 1199 and 1246 the lands and living of Poulton had once more been forfeited or disposed of by the Lancaster monastery, but in the absence of any records bearing on the subject, the manner and reason of the relinquishment must still continue enveloped in a veil of mystery. From 1246 the vicarage of Poulton remained attached to the Lancaster foundation until the dissolution of alien priories, when it was conveyed to the abbey of Sion, in Middlesex, and retained by that convent up to the time of the Reformation in 1536. Alien priories, it may be explained, were small monastic institutions connected with the abbeys of Normandy, and established on lands which had been granted or bequeathed to the parent houses by William the Conqueror or one of his followers. They were occupied by only a very limited number of brethren and members of the sisterhood. A prior was appointed over each, his chief duty being to collect the rents and other monies due from their estates, etc., and transmit them over to Normandy. Such immense sums were in that way annually exported out of the country, that it was ultimately deemed expedient by the king and his ministers to suppress all priories of this description.

The Banastres were a family long connected with the Fylde through landed property which they held in the neighbourhood; originally they are stated to have come over from Normandy with William the Conqueror, and to have settled at Newton in the Willows. On their frequent journeys to and from Thornton, Singleton, and Staining, the tenants of the priory of St. Mary were in the habit of crossing over the lands of the Banastres, by whom their intrusions were deeply resented, which led to constant feuds between them and the head of the Lancaster monastery. In 1276, as we learn from the “Regist. S. Mariæ de Lanc.,” Sir Adam Banastre with several of his friends and retainers, amongst whom were John Wenne, Richard le Demande (the collector), William de Thorneton, Richard de Brockholes, Geoffrey le Procuratoure (the proctor), and Adam le Reve (the reeve), attacked the prior, Ralph de Truno, and his train of attendants, when on their way to Poulton. They seized and carried off both him and his retinue to Thornton, where, after treating them with great indignity, they chastised and imprisoned them. Edward I., on hearing of the disgraceful outrage, appointed John Travers, William de Tatham, and John de Horneby to investigate the matter and ascertain the cause, if possible; but no paper is now to be found revealing the result of the examination or hinting at the provocation, although a surmise may be hazarded that it was no new quarrel, but simply the old feud, which had at last culminated in a cowardly assault on a defenseless ecclesiastic.

In 1299, Poulton was held in trust by Thomas, earl of Lancaster, for the prior of St. Mary; and eight years anterior to that date the abbot of Deulacres, in Staffordshire, drew certain revenues from land in the township, viz., £8 per annum from 16 carucates of land, about 13s. 4d. each year from the sale of meadow land, 10s. from assessed rents, and £5 from the profit of stock, making in all an annual total of £14 3s. 4d. The repeated disputes between Sir Adam Banastre and Adam Conrates, prior of Lancaster, relative to the trespasses of the latter’s tenants and the collection of tithes on the domains of the former were peaceably settled in 1330, by an arrangement, in which Sir Adam pledged himself to allow two good roads across his lands—one from Poulton and Thornton to Skippool and thence across the ford of Aldwath, now called Shard, on to Singleton, the other starting from the same localities and running to the ford of Bulk higher up the river, probably the modern Cartford, or in its vicinity; in addition the knight agreed to make good any damage that the prior or his dependants might suffer over that portion of their journeys.[72] Adam Conrates on his side promised to withdraw all actions for trespass, etc., on the fulfilment of these conditions. In 1354 a person named Robert de Pulton held some small possessions in Poulton, but nothing further than that trifling fact is recorded about him, although it is probable from the orthography of his name that his ancestors were at some time closely and honourably associated with the town from which their distinctive appellation appears to have been derived. During the time of Elizabeth, James Massey, gentleman, of Carleton and Layton, purchased from the governors of the Savoy Hospital, in London, the tolls in the parish of Poulton, together with all the “chauntry and appurtenances” founded in the parish church of Bricksworth, and all messuages, lands, tenements, etc., situated in the town and parish of Poulton; the tolls remained subject to an annual rent of £2, to be paid on St. Michael’s day to the governors and chaplains of the hospital. Later in the same reign James Massey sold to William Leigh, esq., of High Leigh, in Cheshire, half of these tolls and some pasture fields, called “Angell’s Holme,” adjoining the Horse-bridge, where in earlier days, when the waters of Wyre made their way along a brook into the interior of this neighbourhood, boats are said to have been built. The Rigbys, of Layton Hall, subsequently became possessed of a great part of Poulton, and at the present day a large number of houses are leased in their name for the remainder of terms of 999 years; the Heskeths, of Mains, and other leading families in the district were also considerable property owners in the town. On one occasion the ruling powers of Kirkham made an unsuccessful attempt to obtain the tolls arising from the cattle fairs held in Poulton and Singleton, but on what plea such claims were urged the record is silent.

In an entry which occurs in the lists of the Norman Roll, an impost consisting of the ninth of corn, fleeces, and lambs, and created in 9 Edward III., 1336, it is stated that in 1291 the vicarage of Poulton was taxed by Pope Nicholas at 10 marks, or £6 13s. 4d. modern coinage, the prior of Norton taking £2 in garbs or wheat sheaves. Afterwards the vicarage was freed from the payments of tenths on account of the smallness of the living. Dr. Whittaker informs us that the priory of Lancaster was granted by Henry V., in 1422, to the chancellor of England, who in that year instituted a vicar to the living of Poulton, but eight years previously, in the same reign, the priory was granted in trust for the abbess and convent of Sion; from which seemingly contradictory statements it may be gathered that the chancellor was the trustee for the property, and in such capacity alone acted as patron of the church of Poulton. In support of this supposition may be cited the fact that the Lancaster house and its belongings were not received by the convent in Middlesex until 1431, during the sovereignty of Henry VI., when the vicarage was endowed by the abbess, and William de Croukeshagh presented to the living. This pastor, the earliest personally mentioned, was succeeded on his death, in 1442, by Richard Brown, appointed by the same convent. “Among the records,” writes Baines in his history of Lancashire, “in the Augmentation Office is in indenture tripartite in English, bearing the date 11 Henry VIII., 1579, and purporting to be made between the Abbess of Sion on the first part, Thomas Singleton and Henry Singleton on the second part, and William Bretherton, vicar of Poulton, on the third part, by which the tithe-sheaf of Pulton and a tenement are leased to the vicar, that he may better keep and maintain his house in Pulton; the term to continue during the existence of a lease granted to the persons named Singleton by Sion abbey.” At the Reformation the manor and advowson were claimed by the crown, and a few years later became the property of the Fleetwoods. The last royal presentation to the living was made by Edward VI. in 1552, just one year before his death, whilst the first by this family was in 1565, by John Fleetwood, lord of the manor of Penwortham. The Rev. Charles Hesketh, M.A., of North Meols, is now the patron.

The ancient church of Poulton stood on the site now occupied by the existing edifice, and like it, was dedicated to the Saxon St. Chad or Cheadda, bishop of Mercia, and seated at Chester in A.D. 669. The original structure consisted of only a nave and north aisle, the outer walls of which were composed of sandstone, whilst the double roof rested on semicircular arches, extending from the chancel to the font, and supported on four octagonal pillars. These semicircular arches belonged to a very antique style of architecture, and have given rise to the belief that the pillars were at first massive cylinders, being carved into an angular form about the time of Henry VIII. The pulpit had its place towards the south, and at the east end there appears to have been a small gallery. A pipe clay monument in memoriam of the Singletons, of Staining, stood inside the church, but was, intentionally or accidentally, destroyed when the building was pulled down. A rude brass crucifix and a chalice, both of which belonged to the church previous to the Reformation, are still preserved, one being in the possession of a late priest at Breck chapel, and the other in the Catholic chapel at Claughton. The upper halves of the windows, including the east one, were semicircular in form. In 1622 the old chancel was repaired by the Rev. Peter Whyte, the vicar, and a stone, two feet in length and one foot and a half in depth, bearing the name “Peter Whyte,” and the date “1622,” in raised letters about six inches long, was placed over the east window. This piece of masonry now occupies a situation in the south-west corner of the edifice. The churchyard, which is reported to have been usually in a filthy and disgraceful state, was partly surrounded by a moderately wide ditch, on the brink of which three or four fine sycamore trees flourished, but were cut down when sundry alterations and improvements were effected in the ground. In 1751, after the old church had been standing six centuries and a half, it was determined to demolish it, and erect a more commodious building on the site. The tower, however, was retained, as, being of more recent date, it evinced none of those symptoms of decay which had rendered the body of the edifice dangerous to worshippers. An opinion prevails that the tower was built about the time of Charles I., and such a view is upheld by the discovery on the removal of the pulpit in 1836 of a square stone, having on its face the raised letters TB. WG. in the first line, IH. TG. IH. in the second line, and WG. 1638 in the last line. It is supposed that this stone, which is now fixed in the wall at the south-west corner of the church, was carved in commemoration of the erection of the tower, and the raised letters are the initials of the churchwardens then in office, and the date when the work was accomplished. Between this stone and the one previously referred to, there is a stained-glass memorial window to “Robert Buck, born 1805, died 1862, presented by his sister, C. D. Foxton.” Mrs. Catherine Dauntesy Foxton, the lady here indicated, is the representative of the family of Bucks, of Agecroft Hall, Pendlebury, and inherited considerable property in the neighbourhood of Poulton. During the time the new church was in course of building, divine service was performed in the tithe-barn, and the ceremony of baptism at the residences of the parents. The funds required for carrying out the important undertaking were doubtless chiefly supplied through the munificence of a comparatively small circle of private individuals, whose contributions would probably be in some measure supplemented by minor collections amongst the less opulent agriculturists and peasantry. One person, named Welsh, who resided at Marton, seems to have cherished a bitter antipathy to the levelling of ancient structures in general, and embodied his refusal to assist this particular work in the following rhymes:—

“While here on earth I do abide,

I’ll keep up walls and pull down pride;

To build anew I’ll ne’er consent,

And make the needy poor lament.”

It has usually been affirmed that the side galleries were not erected until several years after the new church had been finished, but the annexed extract from an old document discovered in 1875, shows that authority to build them was obtained in 1751, whilst the church was levelled with the ground; and as the parchment also discloses that a number of seats in these galleries were allotted to certain gentlemen of the parish in the ensuing year, there is ample evidence that the rebuilding of the church and their erection were carried on simultaneously:—“25 June, 1751. On the Certificate and request of Roger Hesketh, Esq., Patron; the Rev. Robert Loxham, Clerk, Vicar; and the Churchwardens of the Parish Church of Poulton; a Faculty was Granted to John Bird, John Birley, and Richard Tennant, all of Poulton, Gentlemen (for the better uniformity of the Parish Church of Poulton, which was then taken down and rebuilding) to take down the Gallery over the Chancel in the East of the said Church, which was then very irregular and incommodious, and to rebuild the same with a convenient staircase, stairs, and passage leading thereto, of their own expense, in the west end thereof to adjoin to the north side of the gallery there then standing, and to be made uniform therewith, and to make satisfaction to the several owners of the seats in the said Gallery for the damage sustained in removing the same and altering, and lessening the seats therein; and to erect a Gallery on each side of the said Church, with convenient staircases leading thereto at the north-east and south-east ends of the said Church, if necessary, according to the form of the said Certificate annexed, and also to remove the Pulpit and reading desk from the place where the same then lately stood, near to the place where the Churchwardens’ seat was then lately situate, as it would greatly tend to the conformity of the said Church and to the benefit and advantage of the Inhabitants of the said Parish, and also that they might have liberty to sell and dispose of the seats to be contained in the said intended side Galleries, to such persons within the said Parish as should stand most in need thereof, to reimburse themselves the charges and expenses they would be necessarily put to in building the said intended galleries and making the alterations aforesaid.”

The present edifice is of stone, plain but commodious, and comprises a chancel, body, and embattled tower, with buttresses supporting each corner. Formerly a small shed stood on one side of the tower, and was used as a repository for the sculls and other osseous relics of humanity, which were unearthed during the process of making fresh graves; this house was pulled down some years ago, and its numerous treasures returned to the ground at the south-east corner of the yard. The chancel now standing was erected eight years since, mainly through the exertions of the Rev. Thomas Clarke, M.A., the vicar, who died in 1869. On the exterior of the building, over a door at the south-east corner of the body is the inscription:—“Insignia Rici Fleetwood Ari Hujus Eccliæ Patroni Ann Dni 1699”; above which is a circumscribed uneven space formerly occupied by the arms of the Fleetwood family. Within the church the quarterings of the Heskeths and Fleetwoods are hung against the walls in frames. At the west end of the building there is a wooden panel into which the following names have been cut:—

• Rich. Dickson.
• Rich. Willson.
• John Hull.
• Rich. Willson.
• John Woodhouse, churchwardens, 1730.

From the way in which the holders of similar offices are arranged at present it is surmised that these gentlemen respectively represented the townships of

• Poulton.
• Carleton.
• Hardhorn.
• Thornton.
• Marton.

On the south side of the church is a mural tablet to the memory of the Rev. Richard Buck, M.A., of Agecroft Hall, Pendlebury, born 1761, died 1845, also Margaret, his wife, and Margaret, his daughter. Another monument bears the names of Frances Hull, born 1794, died 1847; William Wilson Hull, born 1822, died 1847, in the Queen’s service, at Bathurst, St. Mary’s Island in the river Gambia; Henry Mitchell Hull, M.A., born 1827, died 1853; John Hull, M.D., born 1761, died 1843—“left the eldest of the three children of John Hull, surgeon; an orphan at six years of age, poor, friendless, by the best use of all means of education within his power, by unwearied industry, by constant self-denial, he duly qualified himself for the practice of his profession[73]”; Sarah Hull, died 1842; William Winstanley Hull, M.A., Fellow of Brazenose College, Oxford, and Barrister-at-Law, eldest son of John Hull, M.D., F.L.S., born 1784, died 1873. Here also was the old churchwardens’ pew, removed in 1876, having a brass plate inscribed thus:—“Thomas Whiteside, Jno Wilkinson, Jno Whiteside, Thos. Cornwhite, Jno Hodgson, Churchwardens, 1737”; also the old pew formerly belonging to the Rigbys of Layton Hall, on the door of which are carved the letters “A.R.,” a goats head, and the date “1636,” being the initials and crest of Sir Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall. Until last year, when they were removed to afford space for more modern seats, the two family pews of the Fleetwoods and Heskeths stood on this side. The pews were walled in laterally and in front by a high ornamental railing of oak, and in the larger of the two traces of a crest were visible on the wall. Near this spot there are many very ancient pews, one of which has the date and initials “17.TW.02” carved upon it, whilst on the floor of the aisle close at hand is the gravestone of “Edward Sherdley, gentleman, dyed 21st September, 1744, aged 71,” and almost adjoining lies another stone, surmounting the remains of Geoffrey Hornby, who died in 1732. On the day of the latter gentleman’s funeral the west side of the market-place was destroyed by fire, and as the procession passed the scarves of the mourners were scorched by sparks driven by a high wind in showers from the conflagration. On the north side of the church is a pew bearing the date ‘1662’; and near to are the old pews of Burn Hall, Little Poulton Hall, Mains Hall, and Todderstaff Hall, above which, fastened to the wall and marking the resting place of several members of his family, are the arms of Thomas Fitzherbert Brockholes, esq., of Claughton, the lord of Little Poulton, etc.

The chancel contains a monument in memory of Bold Fleetwood Hesketh, died 1819, and his nephew, Edward Thomas Hesketh, died 1820; also of Fleetwood Hesketh, of Rossall, who died in 1769, aged 30, and Frances Hesketh, who died in 1809, aged 74, all of whom were interred beneath the Communion. In addition there are two recent tablets, one being to the memory of the late Thomas Clarke, vicar of the parish; and the other in memory of Francis Wm. Conry, only child of F. A. Macfaddin, surgeon, 47th regt. Within the Communion rails are two antique and elaborately carved oak chairs.

In the south gallery are mural tablets inscribed in remembrance of Edward Hornby, died in 1766, and Margaret, his wife; Edward Sherdley, died 1744, and Ellen, his wife; Giles Thornber, J.P., died 1860, and his wife; Geoffrey Hornby, died in 1732, and Susannah, his wife; Richard Harrison, vicar of Poulton, died in 1718, aged 65; and Christopher Albin, curate of Bispham, died in 1753, aged 56, on a pew door opposite to which is a brass plate engraved:—“Introite et orate, cælo supinas si tuleris manus sacra feceris, malaque effugies.[74] Christopher and Margery Albin 1752.”

At one time a sounding board was suspended over the pulpit. An ancient font, formerly belonging to the church and now the property of the vicar, the Rev. William Richardson, M.A., has carved upon its exterior the date 1649, the letters M.H., a cross, and something, in its damaged state difficult to trace but betraying some resemblance to a crown. The successor to this font was removed several years since to make room for a new one presented by the daughter of the Rev. Canon Hull, of Eaglescliffe, in memory of her sister Frances Mary Hull, who died in 1866, aged 20 years.

The old church books, extracts from which will be given subsequently, contain many entries of sums paid for rushes to strew the pews and aisles, a custom existing here as late as 1813. In the tower is a peal of six bells, with the inscriptions:—

The 6th bell was recast by G. Mears and Company, of London, in 1865, at the sole expense of the Rev. T. Clarke, and is inscribed:—“T. Clarke, M.A., vicar; W. Gaulter, J. T. Bailey, W. Jolly, J. Whiteside, churchwardens.” The original inscription was—“Robert Fishwick, John Wilkinson, William Cookson, James Hull, John Moore, churchwardens.”

About thirty years since the roof of the church was altered and renewed. Notwithstanding the fact that the churchyard has been in constant use for so many centuries very few emblems of antiquity, beyond occasional coins of the Roman era, have ever been discovered in it, and at present, unlike most burial grounds of great age, no specimens of raised letters are to be seen amongst the numerous gravestones, the oldest of which still legible, intimates the resting place of Richard Elston, and has the date 1719. At a short distance, and assisting to flag a side pathway to the south of the church, is another stone, covering the grave of “Richard Brown, of Great Marton, who died the third day of April, 1723”; but neither this nor the foregoing one have any interest beyond their antiquity. The ancient practice of tolling the Curfew-bell is still continued in the winter evenings from the 29th of September to the 10th of March, whilst a pancake bell is rung at 12 o’clock on each Shrove Tuesday.[76]

Of the earlier vicars mentioned above, nothing is known until we come to the Rev. Peter Whyte, of whose immediate descendants it is recorded that, after his death, they rapidly drifted into poverty, and that one of them, a granddaughter, regularly attended the fairs of Poulton as the wife of a pedlar or hawker. The Rev. Richard Harrison was cousin to Cuthbert Harrison, the Nonconformist divine who suffered ejection, and belonged to the Bankfield family. Until instituted to Poulton, Richard Harrison was curate at Goosnargh. His son Paul gained some celebrity as a controversial writer on matters of ecclesiastical interest.[78] The Loxhams settled at Dowbridge, near Kirkham, and that estate is still held by the family. The Rev. Thomas Turner purchased the living in 1770, when it was worth no more than £75 per annum, for £200, and held it until his death forty years later. The Rev. C. Hesketh, M.A., brother to the late Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, bart., is rector of North Meols and patron of the living. During a portion of the time when he was vicar of Poulton, the Rev. R. Bowness was curate in charge. The Rev. John Hull, M.A., is honorary canon of Manchester, and was examining chaplain to the Right Rev. Prince Lee, D.D., the first bishop of this diocese, by whom he was appointed to the rectory of Eaglescliffe, near Yarm, one of the most valuable livings in his gift. The Rev. Thomas Clarke, M.A., was originally curate at the Parish Church of Preston, and afterwards became incumbent of Christ Church in the same town, which living he resigned on being presented to the vicarage of Poulton.

Subjoined are a number of extracts selected from the old account books of the churchwardens, and in them will be found much that is both interesting and curious:—

“1764.

“June 4.—To the Ringers, being his Majestie’s Birthday, 3s. 0d.

July 8.—To a Bottle of Wine to a strange Parson, 2s. 0d.: To ditto to a strange Parson, 2s. 0d.

“1765.

“June 6.”—To Mr. Lomas for mending clock, 2s. 2d.

August 18.—To Thomas Parkinson for Rushes, 6s. 8d.: Spent when Rush came, 1s. 7d.

Oct. 20.—To Mr. Loxham for a Prayer, 2d.

Dec. 25.—Spent Receiving Bassoon, 1s. 6d.: To Clark in full for wages, £4 0s. 0d.: To Ringers Last half yʳ Sallary, 18s. 0d.: To Singers in full, 12s. 6d.

“1766.

“Sept. 15.—Rushes for Church, 6s. 8d.: Candles, Beesoms, &c., 12s. 6d.

“1767.

“May 13.—Court fees at Visitation, 7s. 10d.: Churchwardens’ Expenses at Preston, £1 7s. 5d.: Curat’s horse hire to Dᵒ, 2s. 6d.

July 20.—To Reed for Bassoon, 4s. 6d.

Nov. 21.—To Hugh Seed for Flaggin, £6 18s. 8½d.: To Thos. Crook for Church steps, 18s. 4d.: Ale at fixing dᵒ, 1s. 0d.

“1768.

“Sept. 1.—To Mr. Warbrick for Cloth for Surpᶜᵉ, 10½d.: To a Sacrament day, 11s. 6d.

“1769.

“Feb. 1.—To A New Prayer Book, £1 1s. 3d.

” 6.—To Cleaning Candlesticks, 2s. 0d.

Mar. 27.—To Cash wᵗʰ Marton Parson, 5s. 5d.

Received
By Miss Hesketh’s Burial in the Church, 3s. 4d.

“1770.

“Mar. 13.—To Cash allowed Church Wardens for attending sacramᵉⁿᵗ, 5s. 0d.

“1771.

“May 29.—To Ringers ale, 3s. 0d.

Aug. 18.—Spent when Parson Hull preeched, 4s. 6d.

“1772.

Aug. 14.—To cleaning Windows, 7s.; and lowance of ale 2s. 6d.

“1774.

“July 4.—Spent on Parson Eckleston and another strange Parson, one Red prayrs and the other preached, 3s. 6d.

Dec. 21.—To Expense of a Meeting in sending for boys that had done Mischief at Church, 1s.

“1775.

“May 3.—To 5 Church Wardens attending 7 Sacrament Days, £1 15s. 0d.

May 6.—To Horse Hire for 5 Church Wardens twice to the Visitation, £1 5s.: To Wᵐ Brown for ale for Richᵈ Rossall whilst he was altering Pulpit, and at settling his accᵗ, 3s.

June 30.—Spent on Martin Singers, 10s.

Oct. 4.—Spent on St. Lawrence’s Singers, 18s. 4d.

“1781.

“July 14.—It is agreed this Day among the Parishioners of the several Townships of Poulton that all arrears belonging to the said Parish unto the time of Visitation last past shall be paid and discharged by a Tax regularly laid upon the Parish in general, and that all charges of Organ and Organist for the Parish Church of Poulton shall not be defrayed hereafter by any Tax levied on the Parish in general but by voluntary subscription only. In witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands the Day and Year above written.

Thomas Turner, Vicar of Poulton; Edwᵈ Smith, James Bisbrown, Paul Harrison.

“1782.

“Feb. 6.—Recᵈ for Mr. Brockhole’s Burial in the Church, 3s. 4d.

July 27.—Memorandum: It is agreed at this Vestry Meeting by all the parishioners who have attended here that in future the public ringing days in this parish shall be reduced to two, namely, the King’s Birthday and Christmas Day,—the ringers to be allowed Six Shillings on each day; and further, that the Church Wardens’ Expenses on every Visitation shall on no pretence exceed forty shillings.—Joseph Harrison, William Dickson, James Standen, Edw. Smith, Thos. Twiss, Rich. Singleton, Thompson Nickson.

“1788.

“June 7.—Cartage of Rush and allowance, 9s. 0d.: Kirkham Singers, 10s. 6d.

“1793.

Dec. 8.—To Cash Recᵈ for digging a grave in the Church for Mrs. Buck, 3s. 4d.

Nov. 5.—Spent on Singers, 12s. 0d.: ditto on Ribbons for Girls, 2s. 0d.

“1798.

“Oct. 4.—To Ringers on Nelson’s Victory, 2s. 6d.[80]

“1805.

“June 9.—To Expˢ to Church Town when John Sauter Clerk convicted himself in getting drunk, and Timothy Swarbrick for making him drunk (when they were each fined 5s.), 1s. 6d.

Oct. 2.—To Rush, 14s. 3d.

“1806.

Nov. 9.—To Ringers at Lord Nelson’s victory of Trafalgar on the 21st, 7s. 0d.

N.B.: No money to be given to the Ringers on account of any Victory in future on the Parish account; the Victory of Trafalgar was so Extraordinary that 7s. was allowed to the Ringers on that occasion.

“1811.

“Resolved that in compliance with the request of the inhabitants of Marton one pound shall be allowed for an annual Dinner on Easter Day in future.

“1817.

“Nov. 20.—To Expenses to Churchtown when Wᵐ Hodkinson, Wᵐ Whiteside, and Wᵐ Butcher was convicted for getting drunk—Wᵐ Hodkinson finde, and the other two acquitted upon the promise of future good behaviour, 3s. 0d.”

The following extracts from the parish registers show the numbers of marriages, baptisms, and burials, which took place during the last and first years of the specified centuries:—

Anterior to 1674 the old vicarage was a thatched building of two stories, the upper one being open to the roof and supported on crooks, but about that date the vicar, the Rev. Rich. Harrison, made an addition, abutting the west end, and put the original portion in thorough repair. This house, which was surrounded by venerable trees, was taken down in 1835, and the present vicarage erected on the site.

In 1830, a spacious building, capable of holding three hundred persons, was erected in Sheaf Street by voluntary subscription for the purposes of a Sunday School, previous to which a small cottage in the Green had been used as a meeting place for the scholars connected with the church.

About one hundred and fifty years ago the town of Poulton presented a very different appearance to that it wears in our day. The market-place was surrounded by a number of low thatched houses of very humble exteriors, if we except a few private residences, as those of the Walmsleys and Rigbys, which stood out conspicuously from the rest, not only by their superiority in size, but also by the possession of slated or flagged roofs. The house of the Rigbys was built in 1693 by Sir Alexander Rigby, of Layton Hall, who was High-sheriff of the county in 1691-2, and stands at the south end of the square, the family arms and date of erection being still attached to the front wall. The building is now used as a dwelling and retail shop combined, and contains little of moment beyond the ancient oak balustrade and staircase. It is probable that Sir Alexander Rigby built the house with the intention of using it as a town residence for himself and family during the winter months, for we must remember that Poulton contained several persons of note and distinction at that time, and nothing is more natural than that the knight should prefer the cheerful society to be found amongst them to the long solitudes of the Hall during the dull, inclement season of the year, when country roads were almost impassable. After Sir Alexander Rigby had been released from prison, having satisfied the claims of his creditors, he took up his abode permanently in Poulton until his death, Layton Hall and other property having been sold, but whether his remains were laid in the churchyard here, or removed elsewhere, cannot be ascertained.

At the opposite end of the market-place was the Moot Hall, connected with which were shambles and pent-houses, the latter being continued along the fronts of the dwellings in the square. None of the streets could boast a pavement, and as a consequence intercourse between the inhabitants in rainy weather was a matter of considerable inconvenience and difficulty, visiting under such unfavourable circumstances being usually performed by means of stepping stones. Public lamps were unknown in the streets, and any one whose business or pleasure took him abroad after night-fall or dusk, would have to rely on the feeble glimmer of a horn lantern to guide him along the proper track and protect him from floundering in the mud. Looking on this picture of discomfort, it seems pretty certain to us that our Poultonian forefathers at least, could they but enjoy one week of our modern life and improvements, would be the very last to join in the wish, so often enthusiastically, but rather thoughtlessly, expressed, for a revival of the good old times. The market-square still retains its fishstones, cross, whipping post, and stocks; and although the wooden portion of the last has been recently renewed, we are in a position to inform the curious or alarmed reader that it has not been done with the view of re-introducing the obsolete punishment, but merely to preserve a link, be it ever so painful an one, with the past. The cross surmounts a stone pillar placed on a circular base of similar material, formed in steps and tapering towards the column.

Although Poulton was never the scene of any military encounter during the unsettled eras of our history, still there is ample proof that the inhabitants were far from lethargic or indifferent to the course of events during those times. During the reign of Henry VIII., when James IV. of Scotland succumbed to the superiority of the English arms, and yielded up his life on Flodden Field, the yeomanry and husbandmen of this town were well represented; and the cheerful alacrity with which they hastened to join the royal standard under Lord Stanley, in company with others from the Fylde, between here and Preston, is lauded in an ancient ballad, written to celebrate the victory, from which the following lines are extracted:—

“From Ribchester unto Rachdale,

From Poulton to Preston with pikes,

They with yᵉ Stanley howte forthe went.”

There is no necessity to recapitulate the stirring incidents of the Civil Wars, the bivouacking and plundering in the neighbourhood or the frequent demands for recruits by the royal and parliamentary generals, but it will be sufficiently convincing of the earnestness and loyalty of the inhabitants to state, that most of the local families of influence risked their lives and fortunes in the service of the king, leaving little doubt that those of humbler sphere would be actuated by a like enthusiasm.

About a century ago it was customary amongst the gentry and more wealthy yeomanry to hold their interments at night by the light of lamps or lanterns, and during the passage of the funeral procession through the town, each householder illuminated his windows with burning candles. The last person to be buried with this ceremony was the Rev. Thomas Turner, the vicar, who died in 1810.

Of the domestic habits of Poulton at that period, and rather earlier, it need only be said that they presented little variation from those of other towns or villages similarly situated; removed from the enervating and seductive temptations of a city, and forced, for the most part, to earn their bread under the broad canopy of heaven, it is not surprising to find that the people were a long-lived and vigorous race. Their feastings and merrymakings took place at fair-times, and at such other seasons as were universally set apart in rural districts for rejoicings and festivity, notably harvest gatherings and the first of May, the latter being especially honoured. On that day the causeways were strewn with flowers, and all things suitable for the festival were lavishly provided; wine, ale, and sweetmeats being freely contributed by the gentry and others. The peasantry were clothed in sober suits of hodden grey, the productions of the “disty and wharl” or spinning wheel, without which no household was considered complete, whilst their food was of the plainest kind, consisting mostly of barley and rye bread, with boiled parsnips and peas eaten in the pod, wheaten bread being reserved for the consumption of the more wealthy classes. The present station at the Breck, a name of Danish origin, and signifying an acclivity, stands either on, or in close proximity to, the site of the old ducking-pond, or rather brook, where the scolds of Poulton were wont in former days to have the

“Venom of their spleen”

copiously diluted and cooled by frequent immersions.

A native of Poulton thus wrote of the town more than fifty years since, and if the present generation but emulates the virtues of its forefathers as herein stated, there are many places which would form, notwithstanding its protracted inertitia, less agreeable homes than the ancient metropolis of the Fylde:—

“Hail happy place, for health and peace renown’d,

Though not with riches, yet contentment crown’d.

Riches, the grand promoter of each strife,

Content, God’s first-best gift in human life.

Here hospitality has fixed her throne,

And discord’s jars by name alone are known;

The stranger here is always entertain’d

With welcome smile and courtesy unfeign’d.

Kind to each other, generous and free,

Plain, yet liberal friends to charity.”

Sixty years since Poulton contained a manufactory for sacking, sail-cloth, and sheeting, belonging to a Mr. Harrison, who lived in the house now in the occupation of R. Dunderdale, esq., J.P., and had his weaving shed at the rear of those premises. That gentleman employed from thirty to forty hands regularly during the time he conducted the business—a period of about fifteen years. An establishment connected with flax dressing and twine spinning, and employing several hands, was located in the house erected by Sir Alexander Rigby, of Layton; and a currier and leather dresser had his works in Church Street. Of other trades and professions in the town at that date, there were four attorneys, two surgeons, seven butchers, nine bakers and flour dealers, three wine and spirit merchants, two maltsters, ten boot and shoe makers, five linen and woollen drapers, four tailors, three milliners, four grocers, three ironmongers, three joiners, two wheelwrights, two coopers, two painters, three plumbers and glaziers, and two corn-millers. Subsequently Harrison’s residence was used for parochial purposes, and formed the town’s workhouse until the bill of Sir Robert Peel brought about the joint system of pauper relief and management under the name of Unions; and at one time small looms were placed in the old shed behind the workhouse, for the purpose of providing remunerative occupation for some of the inmates. Three fairs are held annually for cattle and cloth, and take place on the 3rd of February, the 13th of April, and the 3rd of November, whilst a general market, but very indifferently, if at all, attended, is appointed to be held each Monday. About the year 1840, when the Preston and Wyre Railway was completed and the Poulton Station erected, a dye-house of some considerable size, and one that had done a large business in the Fylde for many years, was taken down, and shortly afterwards the Royal Oak Hotel built on its site. About the same time the old brook, over which the cuckstool hung in earlier days, and whose waters had long been polluted by discharges from the dye-house, was arched over with brick and earth, and included in the station premises. The Railway Hotel was erected a little anterior to the inn just mentioned. The other hotels of Poulton, situated in the town itself, are ancient, and by their size and number, considering the smallness of the present population, are indicative of the former importance of its market and fairs, and intimate that its position as the centre of a wide district was the means of exciting and maintaining a large amount of commercial activity, such as would necessitate the frequent visits of business agents and others. Several private houses can be pointed out as having been in earlier days places of public entertainment, amongst which may be named one now used as a bakery and bread shop in Queen’s Square, and which formerly bore the name of the Spread Eagle Hotel; in Sheaf Street, also, there existed about half a century ago a small but respectable hotel, called the Wheat Sheaf Inn, with bowling green attached, but like other more pretentious establishments, it has been converted into a dwelling-house, whilst a handsome residence occupies the old bowling green.

The Independents were the first section of the Dissenting community to erect a chapel for their members, which they accomplished in 1808. After being in use twenty or thirty years, this place of worship was closed, and not re-opened until about ten years since. In 1819 a chapel was erected by the Wesleyans in Back Street, and in 1861 the building was enlarged. At the Breck there is a Roman Catholic chapel, which stands back some distance from the road leading to Skippool, and is approached by a long avenue of trees. The chapel is a plain brick building, with three unstained windows on each side; and above the entrance has been placed a square stone inscribed with a verse from the Psalms—“I have loved, O Lord, the beauty of thy House, and the place where thy Glory dwelleth,”—and the date of erection, “A.D. 1813.” Within the edifice the pews are open and arranged in three rows, one running down each side, and a double set occupying the central portion of the body. The solitary gallery at the end opposite the altar is lined with seats, and contains a harmonium, whilst the altar itself is handsomely and suitably decorated. The chapel is dedicated to St. John, and on the east and south sides lies the burial ground, wherein may be seen a stone slab carved by an eccentric character of Poulton, named James Bailey, whose remains are now deposited beneath it. The upper surface of the stone is ornamented with the outlines of two coffins, recording respectively the demises of Margaret Bailey, in 1841, and James Bailey, her father, in 1853. Between the coffins, and severing their upper portions, is a cross, with a few words at the foot, on each side of which are the representations of a scull and cross-bones. Other specimens of the sculptural genius of Bailey are lavishly, if not tastefully, scattered over the remainder of the slab. The residence of the priest is attached to the chapel, and in Breck Road are the elegant Gothic schools connected with it. Until the opening, in 1868, of these schools, which have since been extended by the erection of a wing, a loft over an outbuilding facing the priests’ house, received the Catholic children of the parish for educational purposes.

We now come to speak of Poulton as a port, and in this respect our information, it must be acknowledged, is very scanty; the harbours of Poulton were situated at Skippool and Wardleys, on opposite banks of the Wyre, and it was to the cargoes imported to those places that the custom-house of the town owed its existence. At what date it was first established cannot be discovered, but that it was in being nearly two centuries ago is proved by a paper on “The comparative wages of public servants in the customs,” in which the following occurs:—

“We find that William Jennings, collector of the customs at Poulton, in the Fylde, received in 1708, during the reign of Queen Ann, for his yearly services thirty pounds per annum; and five subordinate officers had seventy-five pounds equally divided amongst them.”

The chief traffic of the port was in timber, imported from the Baltic and America; and flax and tallow, which arrived from Russia. In 1825 Poulton was described by Mr. Baines, in his History of Lancashire, as a creek under Preston, and it is probable that such had been its position for a long time anterior to that date. In 1826 Poulton was made a sub-port under Lancaster, and later, when the town of Fleetwood sprang up at the mouth of the Wyre, the customs were removed from Poulton to that new port.

Subjoined are the number of inhabitants of the township at intervals of ten years from 1801, when the first official census was taken:—

In 1770, during the reign of George III., an act of parliament was obtained by means of which a court was established in this town “for,” according to the wording of the deed, “the more easy and speedy recovery of small debts within the parishes of Poulton, Lytham, Kirkham, and Bispham, and the townships of Preesall and Stalmine.” A number of gentlemen engaged in commercial pursuits and residing in these several districts were appointed commissioners, any three or more of whom constituted a court of justice, by the name and style of The Court of Requests; they were empowered to hear and determine all such matters of debt as were under forty shillings, further they were authorised and required, “to meet, assemble, and hold the said Court in each of the said Parishes of Poulton and Kirkham, once in every week at least, to wit, on every Monday at Poulton, and on every Thursday at Kirkham, and oftener if there should be occasion, in a Court-house, or some convenient place appointed in each of the said Parishes.” Each commissioner on being elected took the following oath:—

“I ... do swear That I will faithfully, impartially, and honestly, according to the best of my Judgement, hear and determine all such Matters and Causes as shall be brought before me, by virtue of an Act of Parliament, for the more easy and speedy Recovery of small Debts, within the Parishes etc.; without Favour or Affection, Prejudice or Malice, to either Party. So help me God.”

Edward Whiteside and Simon Russell were elected, respectively, clerk and sergeant of this court, and James Standen, of Poulton, in consideration of having advanced money to pay the expenses of obtaining the act and providing suitable accommodation for its administration, had authority given to him and his heirs to appoint a person to be clerk or sergeant as often as either of those offices should become vacant, until the sum so advanced with lawful interest had been repaid; after which the appointments were to be filled up by a majority of votes at a special meeting of the commissioners, not less than eleven being present. For the better regulation of the proceedings it was enacted that a majority, amounting to five, of the commissioners assembled in court should have full power and authority to make, as often as occasion required, such rules and orders for the better management of the court as might seem necessary and conducive to the purposes of the act, provided always such rules or orders did not abridge or alter the scale of fees as at first arranged, and were consistent with equity and the true intent of the act. In the event of anyone neglecting to comply with an order from this court for the payment of money owing an execution was awarded against the body or goods of the debtor, if the former, the sergeant was, by a precept under the hand and seal of the clerk, “empowered and required to take and apprehend, or cause to be taken and apprehended, such party or parties, being within any of the parishes or townships aforesaid, and convey him, her, or them, to some common gaol, or house of correction, within the county palatine of Lancaster, there to remain until he, she, or they, had performed and obeyed such order, decree, or judgment, so as no person should remain in confinement upon any such execution, for any longer space of time than three months.” In the case of goods the sergeant was similarly empowered “to levy by distress and sale of goods, of such party, being within the parishes or townships aforesaid, such sum and sums of money and costs as should be so ordered and decreed.”

One clause of the act stated that if any person or persons affronted, insulted, or abused, all or any of the commissioners, the clerk, or officers of the court, either during the sitting or in going to or returning from the same, or interrupted the proceedings, or obstructed the clerk or sergeant in the lawful execution of their different offices, he, she, or they should be brought before a justice of the peace, who was hereby empowered to inflict on conviction a fine of not more than 40s., and not less than 5s. The jurisdiction of the court did not extend to any debt or rent upon any lease or contract, where the title of any lands, tenements, or hereditaments came in question; nor to any debt arising from any last will or testament, or matrimony, or anything properly belonging to the ecclesiastical courts; nor to any debt from any horse-race, cock-match, wager, or any kind of gaming or play; nor from any forfeiture upon any penal statute or bye-law; nor did it extend to any debt whatsoever whereof there had not been contract, acknowledgment, undertaking, or promise to pay within six years from the date of the summons, although any of the above mentioned debts should not amount to forty shillings. No attorney or solicitor was allowed to appear before the commissioners as attorney or advocate on behalf of either plaintiff or defendant, or to speak on any cause or matter before the court in which he was not himself a party or witness, under a penalty of five pounds for each offence. It was further enacted “that no action or suit for any debt not amounting to the sum of forty shillings, and recoverable by virtue of this act in the said Court of Requests, should be brought against any person or persons, residing or inhabiting within the jurisdiction thereof, in any of the king’s courts at Westminster, or any other court whatsoever, or elsewhere, out of the said Court of Requests, and no suit which had been commenced in the said Court of Requests in pursuance of this act, nor any proceedings therein, should or might be removed to any superior court, but the judgments, decrees, and proceedings of the said court should be final and conclusive to all intents and purposes; provided always, that nothing in this act should extend, or be construed to extend, to prevent any person from suing for small debts in any other court, where such suit might have been instituted before the passing of this act.” The various fees to be paid to the clerk of the court were—for entering every case, 6d.; for issuing every summons, 6d.; for every subpœna, 6d.; for calling every plaintiff or defendant before the court, 3d.; for every hearing or trial, 6d.; for swearing every witness, plaintiff or defendant, 3d.; for every order, judgment or decree, 6d.; for a non-suit, 6d.; for every search in the books, 3d.; for paying money into court, 6d., if by instalments, 6d. in the pound more; for every execution, 6d.; for every warrant of commitment for misconduct in court, 1s. The fees to the sergeant were—for every summons, order, or subpœna, and attending court with the return thereof, 6d.; for calling every plaintiff or defendant before the court, 1d.; for executing every attachment, execution, or warrant, against the body or goods, 1s.; for carrying every plaintiff, defendant, or delinquent to prison, 6d. more for every mile. Although this was purely a lay-court the commissioners possessed and exercised the power of placing the witnesses on oath previous to receiving their evidence. In 1847 the Court of Requests was superseded by a new court, for the recovery of debts not amounting to twenty pounds, which held its first sitting on Monday, the 23rd of April in that year, under the presidency of John Addison, esq., a barrister and the appointed judge, in the room belonging to the Sunday school. This gentleman wore a silk gown, as prescribed to the judges of these courts, and Mr. Elletson, solicitor, the clerk, was also robed. At the first assemblage the Rev. John Hull, M.A., the vicar, and Giles Thornber, esq., J.P., were seated on each side of the judge. The cases for trial or arbitration only numbered seventeen, and were of little interest, so that the initiative sitting of the court was but of short duration. The circuits apportioned to the judges had an average population ranging from 202,713 to 312,220 persons, and the salary paid to each of these officials was £1,200 per annum. In the schedule of fees it was stated that for the recovery of debts not exceeding 20s. the cost should be 3s.; under 40s., 5s.; under £5, 9s.; under £10, £1; under £20, £1 10s.; and in jury cases 5s. would be charged for the jurymen, while the other court charges would be a little increased. The powers of this court, now designated the County Court, have been considerably enlarged since its first establishment; the following gentlemen are the officers at present connected with it:—

Little Poulton is the name given to a district and hamlet lying on the east of Poulton township, and in it is situated the ancient manorial residence called Little Poulton Hall, and now used as a farm-house. The original mansion stood on the land immediately at the rear of the existing edifice, which was erected about one hundred and ten or twenty years ago. Until the occupation of the present tenant, Mr. Singleton, the foundations of the old Hall remained in the ground, but the indications afforded by them of its dimensions and appearance were not of any great utility. In 1570 Little Poulton Hall was occupied by George, the son of Bartholomew Hesketh, of Aughton, a grandson of Thomas Hesketh, of Rufford, but only in one of the junior lines. George Hesketh married Dorothy, the daughter of William Westby, of Mowbreck, and had issue one son, William, who inherited the estate and resided at the Hall. William Hesketh was living in 1613, about forty years after the decease of his father, and had two children, William and Wilfrid, by his wife Elizabeth, the daughter of John Allen, of Rossall Hall. William, the eldest son, seems to have removed to Maynes, or Mains, Hall, and settled there during the lifetime of his father; it is probable that his younger brother would remain at Little Poulton Hall, but of this we have no positive proof, and consequently can advance it merely as a conjecture. Little Poulton descended in the Heskeths, of Mains, until about 1750, but the name of that family was changed, after the marriage of William Hesketh, of Mains Hall, (living in 1714), with Mary, the daughter of John Brockholes, of Claughton, by Thomas Hesketh, the eldest son of that union, who inherited the estates of his maternal uncle, and assumed the name of Brockholes. Thomas Hesketh-Brockholes died without offspring, and the property passed, successively, to his younger and only surviving brothers, Joseph and James, both of whom adopted the name and arms of Brockholes, and died childless; but by the will of Joseph, Little Poulton and the other estates descended to William Fitzherbert, the brother of his widow Constantia, the daughter of Bazil Fitzherbert, of Swinnerton. William Fitzherbert also assumed the title of Brockholes, and his descendant is the present proprietor.

A family of the name of Barban preceded the Heskeths at the manor house, and Gyles Curwen, a descendant of the Curwens, of Workington, in Cumberland, espoused, about 1550, the daughter and co-heiress of—Barban, of Little Poulton Hall, having issue—Thomas, Elizabeth, Grace, and Winefrid. Thomas Curwen died unmarried; Elizabeth became the wife of—Camden, by whom she had William Camden, Clarenceux king-at-arms; Winefrid married and settled in London; and Grace espoused Gilbert Nicholson, of Poulton, by whom she had issue—Francis, Grace, and Giles. Francis Nicholson had six children—Humphrey, Grace, Bridget, Thomas, Isabell, and Dorothy. Grace Nicholson married Thomas Braithwaite, of Beaumont, and was the mother of nine children in 1613, the eldest, Geoffrey, being fifteen years of age.[81]

On the south side of the Hall is a wood, covering about two acres of land, and freshly planted within the last half century. Until recent years, numerous decaying tree stocks were turned up out of the soil, and their size plainly evidenced the massive nature of the timber formerly growing there. There is a rookery in the modern wood, and it is surmised that there was one also amongst the branches of the ancient trees, and that a large quantity of bullets discovered in a field on its outskirts record the periodical onslaughts on the unfortunate rooks in days when marksmen were not so unerring as long practice and improved firearms have rendered them now. In the hamlet of Little Poulton there are, in addition to the Hall, three antique houses of considerable pretensions, which were erected and occupied by persons of good social standing. One of them, on the opposite side of the road, and a little removed from the old mansion, was built by a gentleman named Fayle, and on an oaken beam over a doorway, now bricked up, in an extensive barn, is the inscription, EF: IF: 1675, the initials of the erector and his wife, with the date when the edifice was completed. This E. Fayle was probably a relative, perhaps grandfather, of Edward Fayle, of the Holmes, Thornton, and afterwards of Bridge House, Bispham, who married, about 1728, Susannah, the younger daughter of Edward Veale, of Whinney Heys, and co-heiress, with her sister, of the Rev. John Veale, of the same place, her only brother. Another respectable dwelling, but like the few other buildings around, becoming dilapidated through age, bears the initials of Henry Porter, and the date 1723, over the entrance. From sundry documents which have come to light, it seems that Henry Porter was a gentleman of influence and position in the neighbourhood, but beyond that no information can be gained concerning him or his descendants. The tenement he held was purchased by the Brockholes, of Claughton, in 1846. Close by the side of Porter’s residence is another of the same model and size, apparently erected by A. Worswick in 1741, but of this person nothing is known. The remainder of the hamlet is made up of a few old thatched cottages.

A free school was established by James Baines, draper, of Poulton, in 1717, shortly before his death; and by his will, dated that year, he bequeathed to Richard Wilson, Richard Whitehead, sen., Richard Johnson, and Richard Thornton, of Hardhorn-with-Newton, yeomen, to Richard Dickson, woollen draper, and Samuel Bird, yeoman, of Poulton, to Robert Salthouse, of Staining, yeoman, and to their heirs “all that Schoolhouse by me lately erected in Hardhorn-in-Newton, and the parcel of land whereon the same is erected, which is enjoyed therewith, and which by me was lately purchased from Thomas Ords, to remain, continue, and be a Free School for ever for the persons and purposes hereinafter mentioned. Item: I give and devise unto the seven said Trustees and their Heirs, all that messuage and tenement, called Puddle House, with the lands enjoyed therewith, about twenty-two acres, to the special end, intent, and purpose, that the rents and profits over ten shillings a year, (allowed for a dinner to the trustees, and their successors, on their meeting about the affairs of this School on the second of February, on which day they shall yearly meet for that purpose), and after all costs for repairs at the said Schoolhouse and ground it stands on be paid, the balance be given to such person as shall yearly and every year be named, chosen, and appointed, by the said seven Trustees, and their successors, or the major part of them, to act as Schoolmaster, to teach and instruct in writing, reading, and other school learning, according to the best of his capacity, all such children of the inhabitants of the townships of Poulton and Hardhorn-in-Newton as shall be sent to the said School, and behave themselves with care and good manners, without any other payment or reward, except what the said children or their parents shall voluntarily give.” The testament then proceeds to direct that when any two of the seven trustees died, the five surviving should at the cost of the estate appoint two other of the “most able, discreet, and sufficient inhabitants in Poulton and Hardhorn within three months,” and that such a practice should be observed as occasion required “to the end that the said charity may continue for ever according to the true intent and meaning of this Will.” The Trustees were invested with power to dismiss any schoolmaster and appoint a successor, regarding whom there was the following clause:—“All Schoolmasters on appointment shall give bond with one or more sureties for good conduct, and be at duty from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m., and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., except from the 1st November to 1st February, in which quarter alone shall they attend on all school days from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m., and 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.; the afternoons of Thursday and Saturday to be holiday.”

The schoolhouse is a whitewashed building, a single story high, and has four windows in front, with one at each end. It stands in the township of Hardhorn-with-Newton, about half a mile from the town of Poulton, and has the annexed inscription fixed on the wall facing the main road:—“This Charity School was Founded and Endowed by Mr. James Baines, of Poolton, who died the 9th January, 1717. Rebuilt 1818.” The lands bequeathed by Mr. Baines have been exchanged for others of greater value across the river Wyre. The attendance at present is small.

Mr. Baines also left £800 to six trustees to be laid out in land, half the annual income or interest from which he directed to be devoted to the “maintenance, use, and best advantage of the poorest sort of inhabitants of the township of Poulton, which receive no relief by the Poor-rate,” and “for putting out poor children of the said township apprentices yearly though their parents receive relief by the Poor-rate.” The other moiety he directed to be devoted to similar purposes in the townships of Marton, Hardhorn-with-Newton, Carleton, and Thornton.

Jenkinson’s Gift or Charity consists of the rents of a small cottage with garden behind, and two detached crofts at Forton, in Cockerham parish, and amounts to about £5 10s. per annum, which is expended in the purchase of books for the scholars of Baines’s school.

Nicholas Nickson, of Compley, in Poulton, by will dated the 12th of April, 1720, charged his estate with the payment, after the decease of his widow, Alice Nickson, of £100 to the churchwardens and overseers of Poulton, in trust, to invest the sum and give half the interest to the vicar for the time being, distributing the remainder amongst the poor house-keepers of the township not in receipt of parish relief. Until the bequest was paid, the heirs of Nickson, after the death of the widow, were ordered to disburse five per cent. interest on the money each year. In 1754 the trustees of this charity released the estate from all charges in consideration of £100, the legacy, paid to them; and on the 18th of July, 1783, Joseph Harrison and the four other churchwardens of Poulton, together with William Brown and Paul Harrison, the overseers, purchased from James Standen, for £120, a close in Poulton, called Durham’s Croft, to hold the same in trust and divide the rents into twelve parts, whereof five were to be given to the vicar, five to indigent inhabitants not receiving relief, and two in aid of the poor’s rates.

CHAPTER VIII.
FLEETWOOD-ON-WYRE.

The site of the present town of Fleetwood was at no very distant period, less than half a century ago, a wild and desolate warren, forming part of the Rossall estate, and belonging to the late Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, bart. At that date the northern side showed unmistakable evidences of having at an earlier epoch been bounded by a broad wall or rampart of star-hills, continuous with the range until recent years visible near Rossall Point, or North Cape, as that portion of the district was locally called, but which has now been destroyed and levelled by the sea. Beyond the warrener’s cottage and a small farm-house on the Poulton road, no habitations existed anywhere in the vicinity; the whole tract of sandhills and sward had been usurped by myriads of rabbits, which were some little time, even after the erection of dwellings, before they entirely deserted the spot where for centuries they had found a home. During the stormy months of winter, and in the breeding season, immense flocks of sea-fowl made their way to these shores, and like the rabbits, were allowed to remain in undisputed and undisturbed possession of the domain they had appropriated.

Whether this district or locality was populated in the earlier eras of history by any of the aboriginal Britons, invading Romans, or piratical Danes, is a question difficult to solve, but the existence of a paved Roman road, discovered some depth beneath the sand when the trench for the sea-wall was being excavated opposite the Mount Terrace, and traced across the warren in the direction of Poulton, proves beyond a doubt that there was traffic of some description, either peaceful or war-like, over the ground at a very remote age. The road is commonly designated the Danes’ Pad, from a tradition that these freebooters made use of it during their incursive warfare in the Fylde.[82] Evidence in support of the belief that this part of the coast was visited by the Danes or Northmen, as the inhabitants of Scandinavia were called, is to be found in “Knot End,” the name by which the projecting point of land on the opposite side of Wyre has been known from time immemorial. In early days there were both the “Great and Little Knots,” or heaps of stones, but the works carried out for the improvement of the harbour involved the destruction of the small, and mutilation of the big “Knot.” Now arises the question, why were these round collections of boulder stones called “Knots?” In answer to which it may be stated that the word “knot” is of pure Scandinavian origin, and in that ancient Northern language always marked a round heap, and we believe also a round heap of stones. This interpretation would be characteristic of what these knots or mounds of stones were before they were despoiled by the Wyre Harbour Company. Such an application of the word to rounded hills of stone is common at no great distance, and must have been applied by the same people to all these rocky elevations, as instance Hard Knot, Arnside Knot, and Farlton Knot, all of which indicate the name by the rotundity of their stony summits, and seem to confirm the opinion that the early inhabitants of Scandinavia visited the coast, suggesting also that they had some settlement in its immediate vicinity.

As regards the Romans, the only traces of their presence which have been discovered in the neighbourhood of the town, consist of the road above mentioned, and a number of ancient coins which were found near Rossall, in 1840, by some labourers engaged in brick-making. These coins, amounting in all to about three hundred, were principally of silver, and bore the impresses of Severus, Sabina, Antonius, Nerva, etc. It is quite possible, however, that other relics belonging to that nation or the Danes, may still exist, hidden by the sand, and more deeply imbedded than it is necessary to sink when preparing for the foundations of the houses, whilst many also may have been submerged by the encroaching waves as they have gradually inundated the north and west sides of the district.

Doctor Leigh, in his Natural History of Lancashire, informs us that at the mouth of the river Wyre there was in his time a purging water which sprang up from out of the sand. “This, no doubt,” says the Doctor, “is the sea-water which filters through the sand, but by reason of the shortness of its filtration (the spring lying so near the river), or the looseness of the sand, the marine water is not perfectly dulcified, but retains a pleasing brackishness, not unlike that which is observable in the milk of a farrow cow, or one that has conceived.”

To the lord of the manor, Sir P. H. Fleetwood, is due the credit of having first conceived the idea of converting the sterile warren into a thriving seaport. Situated at the mouth of a river, the security of whose stream had originated the proverb—“As safe and as easy as Wyre water,” and by the side of a natural and commodious harbour, sheltered from ever wind, the illustrious baronet foresaw a prosperous future for the place, could he obtain permission from parliament to construct a railway to its shores from the important town of Preston, thereby creating a communication with the manufacturing and commercial centres of Lancashire and Yorkshire. In 1835, a number of gentlemen, denominated the Preston and Wyre Railway, Harbour, and Dock Company, having obtained the requisite powers, deputed Frederick Kemp, esq., J.P., of Bispham Lodge, then acting as agent to Sir P. H. Fleetwood, to purchase the land along the proposed route. Operations were commenced with little delay, the work progressed with fair rapidity, and on the 15th of July, 1840, the line was declared open and ready for traffic.

In the meantime dwelling-houses, hotels, and a spacious wharf had been springing into existence. In 1836 the earliest foundation was laid at the south-west corner of Preston Street by Robert Banton, of East Warren Farm. This farm was for a short season a licensed house and brewery, and is now, under the title of Warrenhurst, the private residence of J. M. Jameson, esq., C.E. The new erection, which still bears its original name of the Fleetwood Arms Hotel, made no further progress for about a year, when it was completed by Thomas Parkinson, the head carpenter at Rossall Hall. The first building finished and inhabited in Fleetwood was a beer-house at the south-west corner of Church Street, which was erected in 1836-7, and is now a shop, owned and occupied by Richard Warbrick, outfitter. That small inn or licensed dwelling was in the occupation of a person named Parker, a stonemason, who a little later built the Victoria Hotel, in Dock-street, where he removed and resided for several months, until a sale of the property had been effected.

The streets were marked out by the plough according to the design of Decimus Burton, esq., architect, of London, and so arranged that all the principal thoroughfares, with the exception of the main road of entrance to the town, converged towards the largest star-hill, now known as the Mount, on the highest point of which was placed a small decagon Chinese edifice, surrounded by a raised platform or terrace, whence an extensive view of the broad bay of Morecambe, the lofty ranges of Lancashire, Cumberland, and Westmoreland, and a wide circuit of the neighbouring country could be obtained. The hollow on the south side of the mound was fashioned into the form of a basin, and a semicircular gravelled walk carried along the ridge of each side, leading with a gentle ascent from the entrance gates on the warren at the end of London Street to the summit, whilst the slopes were tastefully arranged and planted with shrubs, to impart a pleasing and ornamental appearance to the otherwise bare sward. These shrubs, as might have been foreseen, speedily withered and perished, owing to the bleakness of the site, and a lack of that indispensable moisture which the dry sandy soil could neither retain nor supply. In earlier days the Mount was commonly known as Tup, or Top, Hill, and formed a favourite resort for pic-nic parties from Blackpool, or some of the surrounding villages, which visited the place during the summer months, to admire the innumerable sea-fowl and their nests, the latter being scattered over the shore in endless profusion.

Building proceeded with rapid strides; house after house sprang up in the lines of streets, which had only lately received their first coating of shingle, and in 1841, one year after the opening of the railway, the town had assumed considerable proportions. Near the entrance from Poulton road were three or four double rows of cottages for the accommodation of the workpeople, and a Roman Catholic chapel. Preston Street contained but few houses in addition to the Fleetwood Arms Hotel; thence, travelling eastward were Dock Street, with the Crown Hotel, as far as and including the Victoria Hotel; the east side of Warren Street, the west side of St. Peter’s Place, the church and Sunday school, both sides of Church Street, Custom House Lane, the Lower Queen’s Terrace, the North Euston Hotel, and the bath houses. The Upper Queen’s Terrace was in process of erection, but was not completed until 1844, after having been allowed, for some reason, to remain in a partially finished state for two years.

The church, standing on a raised plot of ground in the centre of the town and surrounded by an iron palisading, is dedicated to St. Peter, and was first opened for divine service in 1841. It is a stone edifice with a square tower and octagonal spire at the west end, and was erected by voluntary contributions, the site being provided by Sir P. H. Fleetwood, who retained the right of presentation to the living. The interior of the building is neat, and contains sittings for about four hundred persons in the body, with additional accommodation for two hundred more in the gallery, at the end of which are the choir-pew and organ-loft, the latter being occupied by an instrument constructed by Gray, of London. Previous to the alterations, which were made seventeen years since, and consisted of the erection of a gallery and the convertion of some of the private pews into free seats, the family pew of the Fleetwoods stood in front of the organ-loft, and was the only one raised out of the body of the church. The chancel window is of stained glass, large and handsome, representing a central figure of St. Peter bearing the Keys of Heaven, below and on each side of which several scriptural subjects are illustrated. This window, purchased by subscription amongst the parishioners, was inserted in 1860; and in the previous year a handsome font of Caen stone was presented by Mrs. G. Y. Osborne. Two upright tablets, the gift of the late vicar, the Rev. G. Y. Osborne, illuminated with the Ten Commandments, are placed, one on each side of the Communion table. Four other tablets are fixed against the walls of the church, the first of which was erected by a few friends as a tribute of respect to the memory of Dobson Ward, died 1859, aged 43 years, a humble but zealous worker in the Sunday school; another was placed by the Rev. G. Y. Osborne, in loving memory of his deceased daughter; the third, a handsome tablet, was erected at the entrance to the vestry, by parishioners and friends, to the memory of the Rev. G. Y. Osborne, “for 19 years vicar of this parish, who died 11 November, 1871, aged 53 years,”[83] and the last is to the memory of Charles Stewart, esq., died 1873, aged 64 years, late of High Leigh, Cheshire, and Fleetwood. The living, endowed with the great tithes of Thornton and augmented by the pew rents, was originally a perpetual curacy, but during the ministry of the late Rev. G. Y. Osborne, a distinct district or parish for all ecclesiastical purposes was assigned to the church, and the title of vicar accorded to the incumbent.

The burial ground connected with the church is part of the general cemetery, situated near the shore in the direction of the Landmark at Rossall Point, and about one mile distant from the town.

The small building opposite the Church, now used for infants only, was for several years, until the erection of the Testimonial Schools, the ordinary Sunday school under the superintendence of the incumbent of St. Peter’s.

The Market Place, opened on the 7th of November, 1840, is a spacious, paved area, surrounded by a high wall of sandstone.

The two entrances are closed by means of large wooden gates, and lead respectively into Adelaide and Victoria Streets. The central portion of the in-walled space is occupied by a square, wooden structure, covered over with a slated roof, in the interior of which are stalls for the goods of the different farmers and traders. Friday is the market day, and the following list comprises the various commodities exposed for sale on Friday, the 10th of July, 1846, the earliest recorded, with their prices:—

Since the date of the above quotations, Preston has gradually monopolised the chief portion of the grain trade, and consequently transactions in oats and other cereals are not of frequent occurrence at the local markets of the Fylde.

The Roman Catholic chapel, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, was erected at the north end of Walmsley Street, continuous with the line of houses forming the east side of that street, and opened for divine worship on the 15th of November, 1841. A few years since a more commodious edifice, which will be described hereafter, was erected on another and better site, whilst the old one was dismantled, and subsequently converted into cottages.

The Crown Hotel, a handsome and substantial stone structure facing the Railway Station, was the third hotel erected in Fleetwood, the Fleetwood Arms being the first, and the Victoria the second in point of completion. The original dimensions of the Crown have been considerably increased by the addition in recent years of ample stable accommodation, a large billiard room, and several sleeping apartments.

The North Euston Hotel, which was opened almost simultaneously with the Crown Hotel, is a superb stone building in the form of a crescent, with a frontage of nearly 300 feet. This edifice was sold to Government in 1859, and subsequently opened as a School of Musketry. The noble portico in front of the main entrance and the spacious hall within are supported by massive stone pillars, whilst a handsome terrace, raised a little above the level of the street, encircles the whole length of the ground floor, and is protected by an ornamental iron railing. On its transfer to Government, quarters were provided for sixty officers and a staff of military instructors. There were three chief courses of instruction held during each year, but in addition to these were two of shorter duration, one being in the month of January for the adjutants of volunteers, and another a little later for the volunteers themselves. The curriculum was similar to that at Hythe. In 1867 the School of Musketry was discontinued, and after a short interval, in which fresh buildings were added, the whole structure was turned into barracks, and as such continues to be occupied. In the early days of the hotel a T-shaped jetty extended out from the steps on the shore opposite the principal entrance to the distance of low-water mark, and was used by the visitors as a short promenade and landing stage, but after standing a few years the erection was removed, being found to interfere with the course of the steamers and other vessels round that section of the channel.

The bath-houses, each of which contained a spacious sea-water swimming bath, were connected with the North Euston Hotel, and therefore became the property of Government on the transfer of the main building itself. Since that date their internal arrangements have undergone material alterations and modifications to suit the requirements of the military, but their handsome stone exteriors and massive porticoes are still intact.

The custom-house on the Lower Queen’s Terrace is now a private residence in the occupation of Alexander Carson, esq., who is also the owner, and the offices have for many years been situated in a house of more modest pretensions in the same row.

The two lighthouses, one of which is placed in Pharos Street and the other further north, on the margin of the beach, were also in existence in 1841, having been erected a short time previously. The former is a tall circular column of painted stone, having an altitude of about 90 feet above high-water mark. The base of the column is square, each of the sides being 12 feet high and 20 broad. The focus of the lantern is 104 feet above half-tide level, and outside the reflector is a narrow, circular, stone gallery, guarded by an iron fencing. The cost of the column was £1,480. The other lighthouse is much smaller, and stands on a slightly elevated plot of ground. Each side of its base forms a recess, furnished with seats, and supported above by round stone pillars. The centre of the lantern is 44 feet above half-tide level. The whole fabric, which is built throughout of finely cut stone, was erected at a cost of £1,375.

We have now reviewed the general appearance of the town in 1841, including brief accounts of all the more important buildings, but accidentally omitting to state that gas works were amongst the early erections, and before proceeding with the history of its further progress and increase, it will be convenient to revert for a moment to the railway and matters connected with it, leaving, however, the harbour, wharf, and shipping for separate examination towards the later pages of the chapter. The railway, consisting of a single line throughout the whole extent, was carried over a portion of the estuary of the Wyre, along an embankment and viaduct of huge wooden piles, running from Burn Naze to the west extremity of the wharf at Fleetwood, near to which the station is situated. In 1846 the traffic, both in passengers and goods, had increased so rapidly that the directors determined to have a double line without delay. Instructions for that purpose were accordingly issued to the engineer of the company, and at the same time he was directed that, in order to afford space and facilities for the construction of the proposed docks to the westward of the existing railway piling, the double line should diverge at Burn Naze, run round the Cops, and terminate as before. The programme here stated was not fully carried out, and the double line extended only as far as Burn Naze, from which point a single line ran along a semicircular embankment, lying west of the old one, to the terminus at Fleetwood.[84] This embankment was the means of rescuing from the incursions of the tide about 400 acres of marsh land, which has since by drainage and cultivation been converted into excellent pastures and productive fields. The entire line was leased, under acts of 1846, to the Lancashire and Yorkshire and London and North Western Railway companies, the former taking two thirds and the latter one third of the profits or losses. The terms agreed upon were a rent of £7 1s. 6d. per cent., and £1 15s. 4½d. per share on a total capital of £668,000, until the close of 1854, when the payments were raised to £7 17s. 6d. per cent., and £1 19s. 3½d. per share in perpetuity. In the month of July, 1846, the electric telegraph in connection with the Preston and Wyre Railway was introduced into the town, and as its first public act was the interception, at Kirkham, of a defaulting steamship passenger, who had neglected to pay her fare, it may be concluded that the inhabitants welcomed the ingenious invention as a valuable ally in the protection of their commercial interests, as well as a rapid and convenient mode of friendly intercommunion in cases of urgency.

The Improvement Act, for “paving, lighting, cleansing, and otherwise improving the town of Fleetwood and the neighbourhood thereof, and for establishing a market therein,” came into operation on the 18th of June, 1842. Meetings were appointed to be held on the first Monday in every month, at which any male person was empowered to sit as a commissioner on producing evidence that he was either a resident within the limits prescribed by the act, and rated to the poor-rates of the township of Thornton for a local tenement of the annual value of £15, or possessed as owner or lessee or in the enjoyment of the rents and profits of a messuage, lands, or hereditaments, similarly situated and rated, for a term of not less than fifty years. In 1869 authority was obtained to repeal certain sections of the old act and adopt others from the Public Health Act of 1848, and the Local Government Act of 1858, the most important being that in future the Board of Commissioners should consist of twelve members only, having personally the same qualifications as before, but being elected by the ratepayers. The new regulations also ordained that one third of the commissioners should retire each year, and the vacancies be filled up by a general election. This act is still in force.

It was not possible that the claims of a place so happily situated as Fleetwood for a summer residence could long remain unrecognised by the inhabitants of the inland towns. No sooner was free access given to its shores by the opening of the railway in 1840, than the hotels and lodging-houses were inundated with visitors, whose annual return testified to their high appreciation of its mild climate, firm sands, excellent boating accommodation, and lastly, the diversified and beautiful scenery of the broad bay of Morecambe. A number of bathing vans were stationed on the shore opposite the Mount, but were little patronised during the first two or three seasons owing to the proprietors demanding 1s. from each person using them, a sum exactly double that required at other watering-places. The injurious effects of this exorbitant charge were speedily experienced, not only by the van owners, whose receipts were reduced to a minimum, but generally throughout the town, as visitors who greatly preferred Fleetwood were driven to other places on that account, and each year many who came with the intention of remaining during the summer left because their families were debarred from bathing, except at an excessive cost. The error of so grasping a policy being at last demonstrated to the proprietors by the small and diminishing patronage extended to their vans, it was resolved, in 1844, to reduce the charge to 6d. That year several newly-erected houses in Kemp Street were furnished and tenanted, whilst the hitherto unoccupied stone residences comprised in the Upper Queen’s Terrace were fitted up with elegance and convenience for the wealthier class of sojourners, to whom they were let for periods varying from a few weeks to three or four months. The terrace of houses situated between the North Euston Hotel and the Mount, and bearing the latter name, was also completed that year. The prices at the North Euston Hotel were arranged as under:—

During the Whit-week of 1844 the place was crowded with excursionists, many of whom, amounting to 1,000 daily, were carried at half fare by the Preston and Wyre Railway, and came from the neighbouring towns and villages, whilst others arrived by sea in excursion boats from Dublin, the Isle of Man, Ulverstone, Blackpool, and Southport. Festivities were entered into on the warren and slopes of the Mount, lasting three days and consisting of horse, pony, donkey, foot, sack, and wheelbarrow races, a cricket match, foot steeplechases, wrestling, and gingling matches.

In 1844 Fleetwood was reduced from a distinct port to a creek under Preston, and during the month of July the mayor of the latter town paid a state visit to the watering-place, arriving by sea in the small steamer “Lily.” A series of misfortunes rather tended to upset the dignity and imposing aspect of the official cortege. A somewhat rough sea retarded their passage and rapidly converted the ship into a temporary hospital for that, perhaps, most distressing of all sicknesses; nearing, at last, the lighthouse at the foot of Wyre, a large portion of the larboard gunwale was carried away by the bowsprit of the steamer “Express,” which had been sent out to meet and tow them into harbour, if necessary; and finally the unfortunate “Lily” stranded on a bank opposite the beach at Fleetwood, and the mayoral party, now pallid and dejected, in their gorgeous robes and liveries, were brought to land in small open boats, and having formed the following order, marched to the North Euston Hotel, where a banquet was prepared:—

• Three Policemen.
• Two Sergeants-at-Mace.
• Mace Bearer.
• The Mayor in his Robes of Office.
• The Corporation Steward.
• Recorder of the Borough.
• The Aldermen of the Borough.
• The Members of the Common Council.
• Military Officers and Private Gentlemen.
• Town Crier and Beadle.

This year the Preston and Wyre Railway Company, in conjunction with the line from Manchester and Bolton, commenced to run Sunday excursion trains to Fleetwood at reduced fares during the genial months of summer, and in August upwards of ten thousand pleasure-seekers were estimated to have been brought into the town by their means alone. These lines were amongst the first to try the experiment of cheap trains, and the immense success which attended their efforts on the above occasions soon induced them to extend the privileges to other days besides the Sabbath. The promoters of private excursions, also, were offered facilities to direct their course to this watering-place. During the summer of 1844 no less than 60,000 people in all, that is including both day excursionists and those who remained for longer periods, arrived, being considerably more than in any previous season. In July, 1846, the whole of the workpeople of Richard Cobden, esq., M.P., the great free-trade statesman, visited the town to celebrate the triumph of free-trade principles in parliament, the entire expense of the trip being defrayed by that gentleman. Each of the operatives and others, numbering about 1,300, had a free-trade medal suspended by a ribbon from the neck; and, having formed in procession, the large assembly paraded through the streets of Fleetwood, carrying banners adorned with such appropriate mottoes and inscriptions as “Free Trade with all the World,” “Peel, Bright, and Cobden,” etc. In the same year an immense Sunday school trip, bringing no less than 4,200 children and adults, arrived; and after amusing themselves by rambling about the shore for a time, the youthful multitude formed a huge pic-nic party on the warren. This was without doubt the largest single excursion which ever visited these shores, and on its return, the enormous train of two engines and fifty-six carriages, many of which were cattle trucks provided with forms and covered in with canvas, was divided, each engine taking half, for fear of accidents and delays. In later times it was no uncommon circumstance to see the spacious wharf opposite the Upper and Lower Queen’s Terraces, crowded with cheap trains during Easter and Whit-weeks. Hourly trips in the small steam tug-boats or pleasure yachts, pony and donkey rides, bathing, and mussel gathering on the bank opposite the Mount Terrace were the chief amusements of the day visitors, and innumerable were the exclamations of wonder and delight uttered by thousands, who for the first time beheld

“The broad and bursting wave”

at Fleetwood, for our readers may be reminded that at the date of which we are writing, railway fares, except on special occasions, were beyond the compass of the labouring populations of our manufacturing and agricultural districts, and consequently a visit to the, in many cases unknown, sea, was an event eagerly anticipated and long remembered.

In January, 1845, a general meeting of those who were interested in Fleetwood, or wished to testify their respect and admiration for the noble efforts of the founder of the town, was held at the North Euston Hotel, to determine upon the most suitable public testimonial to be erected in honour of Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood. Doctor Ramsay proposed that day schools for 200 children of the labouring classes, with a house for a master and mistress, having the name of the “Fleetwood Testimonial Schools,” open to all denominations of Christians and connected with the National Society, should be erected. This resolution was carried without a dissentient; subscription lists were opened; and on Wednesday, the 26th of August, 1846, the foundation stone of the building was laid by Charles Swainson, esq., of Preston. Large numbers arrived early in the morning to be present at the ceremony. The town, shipping, and river craft, decked out in bunting, presented quite a gala appearance as the officials and guests proceeded to the site in West Street. The procession marched as stated below:—

• The Beadle.
• Band.
• The Wesleyan Sunday School Children.
• The Independent Sunday School Children.
• The Church Sunday School Children.
• The Architect holding the Mallet and Trowel.
• The Contractors.
• The Clergy.
• Charles Swainson, esq.
• The Treasurer and Mr. Swainson’s Friends.
• Rossall School.
• The Gentry and Visitors.
• The Tradesmen.
• Independent Order of Oddfellows.
• The Rechabites.

In the cavity beneath the foundation stone were enclosed a bottle containing coins of the present reign, a copy of the Fleetwood Chronicle of that date, printed on parchment, and another sheet of parchment inscribed thus:—

“The first stone of these schools, which are to be erected as the fittest Testimonial to the benevolent founder of this town, Sir P. H. Fleetwood, Bart., M.P., was laid by Charles Swainson, Esq., of Preston, this 26th day of August, 1846.

• The Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, M.A., Incumbent;
• The Rev. W. Laidlay, B.A., Curate;
• B. Walmsley, Frederick Kemp, Churchwardens;
• The Rev. John Hull, Vicar of Poulton, Chairman of the Committee.
• John Laidlay, Esq., Treasurer of the Committee;
• R. B. Rampling, Esq., Architect;
• H. B. Jones, Esq., Secretary.

Non nobis, Domine, sed nomini tuo da gloriam.”

This scholastic institution is in the Gothic style of architecture, and the principal front, facing into West Street, extends over a distance of seventy-one feet. The interior of the building contains separate school accommodation for boys and girls; and at the east end there is a comfortable residence for the mistress. The school is surrounded by an extensive play-ground, and enclosed by a brick wall, surmounted anteriorly by ornamental iron railings. Since the building was completed the provision for the reception of boys has been greatly increased by the erection of a new wing, by private munificence, abutting at right angles with the east end of the original structure.

In the spring of 1845 a handsome promenade and carriage drive was completed along the border of the shore from the North Euston Hotel to the west extremity of the Mount Terrace. The pathway, which ran on the inner side of the drive, was flagged throughout its entire length, whilst the outer margin of the road was connected with a substantial sea-wall of square-cut stone by a broad and well-kept grass plat. Subsequently this elegant walk was extended round the south side of the Mount, along Abbots’ Walk, and so on by the side of the shore to the Cemetery Road. Very little of the portion first constructed is now to be seen, and that remnant is in such a dilapidated condition as almost to be impassable. Huge stones which formerly protected the green sward and road from the waves are now lying scattered and buried about the beach; whilst the westerly end of the promenade has not only suffered utter annihilation itself, but serious inroads have been made by the water into the ornamental gardens fronting the houses of the Mount Terrace.

Strenuous efforts were put forth during the autumn of 1845 to prevent the visitors forsaking the town immediately the long evenings had commenced; pyrotechnic displays took place each week on the plot of land lying to the north of the Upper Queen’s Terrace, and designated the Archery Ground. Sea excursions to Blackpool, Southport, and Piel Harbour were liberally provided for by the steamers of the port; a military band was hired for several weeks, and played daily either on one of the pleasure craft or near the new promenade; foot races, wrestling, and cricket matches were arranged and contested at short intervals. But all in vain, for towards the end of August the reflux of visitors had thoroughly set in, and by the middle of September the shores were almost deserted. During that brief period of excitement it was proposed amongst the inhabitants to erect a large public building to be ready for the ensuing season, which should combine all the advantages of a reading and news room, public library, bazaar, ball room, and theatre; but either the ardour of the people cooled during the winter months or they failed to discern a fair prospect of dividends from the investment, for the summer of 1846 discovered that the idea had vanished with the closing year, and

“Like the baseless fabric of a vision,

Left not a wreck behind.”

Perhaps, however, it is going too far to assert that no trace or vestige of the comprehensive project remained after the first ebullition of enthusiasm had passed from the popular mind, for we find that, although no noble hall graced the town, a Mechanics’ Institution was modestly established on the 18th of May, 1846, by the opening of a reading room in one portion of the Estate Office. This office formerly occupied the site of the present Whitworth Institute, and was a small, lightly constructed, Gothic edifice. Subsequently a larger and more convenient place for the purposes of the Institution was engaged in Dock Street; a library was provided and arrangements made for lectures and classes to be held on the premises. In the report of the establishment, issued twelve months after its foundation, it was stated that the members at that date amounted to 184, being 138 full members, 20 females, and 26 youths and apprentices; and that since its organisation 213 persons had availed themselves of the privileges offered by the society. A considerable number of cottage houses were erected in different parts of the town, and not only were these tenanted directly they were completed, but the demand for further building was still on the increase. A public abattoir, or slaughter-house, was constructed in 1846 on the outskirts of the town, and a notice issued, prohibiting the slaying of any cattle, sheep, or swine anywhere except within its walls, under a penalty of £5 for every offence. A Wesleyan chapel was also in course of erection in North Church Street, then open warren, and finished the following year, divine service being first conducted in it on Monday, the 24th of May, by the Rev. George Osborne, of Liverpool. As the town gradually developed in size and population, the attendants at this place of worship outgrew the space provided for them, and lately, in 1875, it became necessary to enlarge the edifice. The west gable-end was taken out and the main building extended in that direction. Galleries were placed along the two sides and across the east wall; the old-fashioned pulpit was superseded by a platform situated at the centre of the west end, and extending to within six feet of the galleries at either side. The new sittings resemble the old ones in being closed pews, and not open benches. The chapel is now capable of containing double the congregation it could have held previous to the recent alterations.

In the month of February, 1847, an extraordinary high tide, rendered more formidable by strong westerly winds, did great damage on the coast from here to Rossall; the Landmark was so far undermined that its fall was hourly expected; an embankment raised on the shore from that point to Rossall suffered severely, large portions being completely washed away; and the outbuildings of a farm called “Fenny” were overthrown and destroyed, serious injury being done also to the land in the neighbourhood. The more immediate vicinities of the town escaped with comparatively little loss, the most important being that resulting from the inundation of several fields and gardens near the Cops, and the levelling of a few wooden sheds for labourers’ tools and other outbuildings.

A failure in the potatoe and grain harvests of 1846 spread fearful distress and famine throughout the United Kingdom; bread riots and disturbances amongst the starving poor of Ireland were of frequent occurrence, and it was to assist in alleviating the sufferings of those unfortunate people that a subscription was started in Fleetwood during the latter months of that year. Donations purely from the inhabitants of the town were collected, and in January, 1847, the sum of £105 was forwarded to the sister country. In consequence of the severe national affliction, Her Majesty ordained that Wednesday, the 24th of the following March, should be observed as a general fast-day. On that date all the shops in the watering place, with one or two exceptions, were closed; the public-houses and streets were quiet; and stillness and solemnity everywhere apparent. The church was crowded to overflowing; every seat was packed, and forms were brought in from the Sunday school and placed in the aisles to create extra accommodation, so excessive was the congregation which assembled to join in the special service for divine intervention.

On Monday, the 20th of September, 1847, Her Majesty, Queen Victoria, accompanied by their Royal Highnesses, the Prince Consort, the Prince of Wales, and the Princess Royal, landed at Fleetwood en route from Scotland to London. The spot fixed for the debarkation of the royal party was near the north end of the covered pier, upwards of 100 feet of which were boarded off and converted into a saloon, a covered gallery being erected leading from it to the railway, where the special train was stationed. The floors of the saloon and gallery were covered with crimson drugget and at the entrance to the former a beautiful triumphal arch was formed of various coloured draperies, and adorned with the national flag and other emblems of loyalty. The walls of the saloon were hung with white and coloured draperies, festooned with evergreens, and British ensigns were suspended from the roof. This elegant apartment contained a gallery for ladies at the north end, and near to the entrance was a small octagonal throne, having an ascent of three steps, upon which a handsome gilded chair of state and a footstool were placed. Behind the two latter, draperies of crimson cloth were suspended, surmounted by the Arms of Her Majesty. On Sunday, the 19th of September, the High-sheriff of the county of Lancaster, William Gale, esq., of Lightburne House, near Ulverston, who had arrived in order to receive Her Majesty on the following day, attended divine worship at St. Peter’s Church, being driven there in his state carriage, drawn by four splendid greys and preceded by his trumpeters and twenty-four javelin men with halberds. Monday was ushered in with boisterous winds, a cloudy sky, and other indications of unpropitious weather, which fortunately for the thousands who crowded into the place from Yorkshire, Manchester, and intermediate localities, considerably improved as the day advanced. The ships in the harbour were draped with flags, and similar decorations floated from the windows of almost every house. A little after three o’clock in the afternoon the report of a signal gun announced that the royal squadron, consisting of the Victoria and Albert, the Black Eagle, the Fairy, the Garland, and the Undine, was in sight, and as the noble vessels steamed up the channel the North Euston Hotel and the Pier burst out into brilliant illuminations. As soon as the royal yacht, Victoria and Albert, had been safely moored to the quay opposite the triumphal arch, and the gangways adjusted, the High-sheriff, W. Gale, esq.; Lieut.-General Sir Thomas Arbuthnot, K.C.B.; Sir P. H. Fleetwood, bart.; Major-General Sir William Warre; John Wilson Patten, esq., M.P.; the Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, incumbent of Fleetwood; Henry Houldsworth, esq., chairman of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company; George Wilson, esq., deputy-chairman; and Thomas H. Higgin, esq., managing director of the Preston and Wyre district; presented their cards, and explained to Captain Beechey the several arrangements which had been made for Her Majesty’s conveyance to London. Afterwards Sir P. H. Fleetwood, the Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, Frederick Kemp, and James Crombleholme, esqrs., of Fleetwood; and Daniel Elletson, esq., of Parrox Hall, were admitted to an interview with Lord Palmerston, who, on behalf of Her Majesty, received the subjoined address from the inhabitants of Fleetwood, printed in gold on white satin, and promised that it should be laid before the Queen:—

“The Loyal and Dutiful
ADDRESS
of the
Inhabitants of Fleetwood,
TO HER MOST GRACIOUS MAJESTY THE QUEEN.

“May it Please your Majesty,

“We, the Inhabitants of the Town of Fleetwood, in the county of Lancaster, desire to approach your Majesty on this auspicious occasion, with the most sincere expression of our devoted loyalty and attachment to your Majesty, of our deep respect and esteem for your Majesty’s august Consort, for his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, and the other members of the Royal Family.

“We beg to assure your Majesty that it is with feelings of the liveliest gratitude that we hail this Royal visit to our humble shores, now for the first time pressed by the foot of Sovereignty.

“We rejoice to think that it has fallen to our happy lot to be the first to welcome the Queen of England to her own Royal Patrimony in the Duchy of Lancaster.

“We hasten to lay at your Majesty’s feet the dutiful allegiance of the inhabitants of the youngest Town and Port in all your Majesty’s dominions, which dates its existence from the very year in which your Majesty first ascended the Throne of these realms; and which, from the barren and uninhabited sands of the Fylde of Lancashire, has already obtained some importance for its town of 3,000 inhabitants, its Watering-place, Harbour, and Railway, together with its College for the sons of clergymen and other gentlemen.

“We sincerely trust, that the natural facilities and local arrangements of this Port may be found such as shall conduce to the safety, comfort, and convenience of your Majesty in your royal progress. And we beseech your Majesty to receive our united and solemn assurance, that whatever progress our Harbour and Town may make in wealth and importance, it shall ever be our firmest determination and most earnest prayer, that we may never cease to boast of a loyal population, entertaining the same feeling of devoted duty and attachment to your Majesty and the Royal Family, which we experience at this moment, and which the grateful remembrance of this Royal visit must ever tend to keep alive in our bosoms.

“Signed on behalf of the Inhabitants,

“St. Vincent Beechey, M.A., Incumbent of Fleetwood.”

To the foregoing address the annexed reply was received from London in the course of a few days:—

“Whitehall, 25th September, 1847.

“Sir,—I am directed by the Secretary, Sir George Grey, to inform you, that the Loyal and Dutiful Address of the Inhabitants of Fleetwood, on the occasion of Her Majesty’s late visit, has been laid before the Queen, and that the same was very graciously received by Her Majesty.

“I have the honour to be, Sir, your obedient servant,

(Signed)

“Dennis le Merchant.

“Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, Incumbent of Fleetwood.”

Early next morning the handsome saloon was occupied by the High-sheriff, the Under-sheriff, and a select number of gentlemen, and shortly after ten o’clock Her Majesty and the royal party proceeded from the yacht to the special train amid joyful acclamations which resounded from all parts of the shore. The moment Her Majesty set foot, for the first time, on her Duchy of Lancaster, the royal standard was lowered from the mast-head of the yacht, and instantly raised on the flag-staff at the custom-house of Fleetwood, where it received a salute of twenty-one guns. After another salute of a similar number of guns, as Her Majesty reached the end of the gallery, the royal party entered their saloon carriage, Mr., now Sir John, Hawskshaw, engineer to the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company, took his station on the engine, and the train moved slowly off, followed by the ringing cheers of at least ten thousand spectators.

It should be mentioned that a loyal address, written in Latin, from the students of the Northern Church of England School, at Rossall, arrived too late for presentation, and was afterwards forwarded to London.

In the month of July, 1847, Mr. Thomas Drummond, contractor, commenced the erection of the present Independent Chapel in West Street, and notwithstanding a serious delay through the destruction of the north gable and roof-framing by a heavy gale in September, the building was completed the same year. The edifice, which will contain about 600 persons, is a neat brick structure with side buttresses, and adorned with a castellated tower. Beneath the chapel are spacious school-rooms for boys and girls. The site was granted by Sir P. H. Fleetwood, and conveyed in trust for the use of the church and congregation.

For two or three years little of special interest occurred in the progress or condition of the town. Each summer brought its assembly of regular visitors, upon whom many of the inhabitants depended for support, whilst Whit-week annually inundated the warren, streets, and shores with crowds of day-excursionists, for whose benefit sports, resembling those to which allusion has already been made, were instituted. Regattas also were added to the other attractions of the watering-place, but after existing for some little time they gradually died out, either because they failed to excite their former interest amongst the visitors, or the public spirit of the inhabitants was tardy in providing the funds necessary for their continuance. Houses in Albert Street, and in other parts of the town, were slowly increasing in number, but no large demand for dwellings bespoke a rapid rise in the prosperity or popularity of the place, like that to which we referred a little earlier. Trade, although comparatively steady, evinced no signs of enlargement at present, and as a consequence fresh families hesitated to venture their fortunes in the new land, until some more regular and reliable means of gaining a livelihood were offered them than the precarious patronage of uncertain visitors, many of whom, now that free access had been given to Blackpool and Lytham through the opening of branch lines, were already being seduced from their old allegiance to Fleetwood, and attracted to the gayer promenades of those rival resorts.

In the month of December, 1852, and just at the Christmas season, a fearful hurricane swept over Fleetwood; slates, chimney tops, and boardings were torn from their fastenings, and hurled about the streets; indeed so terrific was the violence of this gale that at its height it was difficult for the pedestrian to avoid being forced along by its fury in whatsoever direction the huge gusts willed. During the storm a singular accident occurred in the harbour. The barque “Hope,” which had arrived shortly before from America with timber, was lying in the river attached to one of the buoys, and by some carelessness the men employed in unloading her had neglected, on leaving their work, to close up the large square hole near the stem of the ship, through which the baulks of wood were discharged. The hurricane came on fiercely and suddenly from the west, and, to the dismay of the solitary watchman who had been left in charge of the vessel, heeled over her lightened hull so that the swollen and boisterous tide poured wave after wave through the unprotected aperture at her bows; a few minutes only were needed to complete the catastrophe, for as the vessel settled in the deep, no longer waves but continuous volumes of water rushed into her, and with a heavy lurch she rolled over on her side, the masts and more than half her hull being submerged. Fortunately, however, the remnant of the cargo was sufficiently buoyant to prevent her from vanishing bodily beneath the surface. The luckless guardian, whose feelings must have been far from enviable, was quickly rescued from the perilous position he occupied on the floating portion of the ship; but it was not until some weeks afterwards that they were able, in the words of the poet Cowper,

“To weigh the vessel up.”

The “Hope,” 415 tons register, was built up the river at the old port of Wardleys, being the only vessel of such dimensions constructed in the shipyard there. Ten years later, on the 27th of February, 1862, this ill-fated barque was abandoned on the high seas in a sinking condition.

In 1854 sundry improvements were effected in the extent and condition of the place, and consisted in part of the erection of a row of model cottages in Poulton Road, near the entrance to the town, as well as a new police Station in West Street, comprising two dwellings for the constables and cells for prisoners. The streets were also put in better order, and efforts made to render the aspect of Fleetwood more finished and pleasing than it had been during the two or three previous seasons. A scheme for the partial drainage of the town was proposed at the assembly of commissioners, and arrangements were entered into for the work to be promptly carried out at an estimated cost of £1,200. Altogether a sudden spirit of activity seemed to have superseded the lethargy or indifference which lately had been too much visible amongst the inhabitants in all matters of public interest, and which had already exercised a serious and baneful influence upon the prospects of the place as a sea-side resort. In the ensuing year the body of Primitive Methodists, which had now become rather numerous, chiefly owing to the prosperity of the fishing trade attracting many followers of that calling to the port, most of whom were members of this sect, commenced and completed a chapel in West Street. Recently it has been found necessary considerably to enlarge the edifice, in order to furnish more accommodation for the increasing congregation. Although the erection of this chapel and of the other buildings mentioned above mark undoubtedly an era of progress in the history of the town, still we are constrained to admit that the wants they supplied were not brought about by the spread of Fleetwood’s reputation as a watering-place. From the first little had been done to supplement its natural attractions by laying out elegant promenades, or improving the state of the Cops or Poulton Road, so as to render them agreeable rural walks for many who, after a time, grew weary of watching the eddies and dimples of the river’s current

“Play round the bows of ships,

That steadily at anchor rode;”

or of daily rambling where the receding waves left a broad floor of firm, unbroken sands. True, a carriage-drive and foot-way of some pretensions to beauty had been constructed along the north shore in 1845, but the storms we have described, and other heavy seas, had torn breaches in its wall, and made sad havoc amongst its light sandy material, completely ruining the fair appearance of the shoreward grass-plat, and threatening the road with that very destruction which has since overtaken it through the continued negligence of the residents or governing powers. There was no public hall, such as that once contemplated, where a feeling of fellowship might be engendered amongst the visitors. The regattas instituted for the interest and amusement it was hoped they would excite amongst the spectators were, as previously stated, conducted in a desultory manner for a few years, and then abandoned; whilst the land sports during the week of high festival were discontinued as the Whit-week excursion trains found other outlets more attractive than Fleetwood for their pleasure-seeking thousands; but it was not until the North Euston Hotel was opened for military purposes, that all hope of reviving the fading reputation of the town as a summer resort was finally relinquished. For some little time after the foregoing transfer, the bathing vans, as if to keep up the fiction of the season, re-appeared with uninterrupted regularity each year upon the beach, but even that last connecting link between the deserted town, as far as visitors were concerned, and its former popularity, was doomed shortly to be broken, for the ancient machines, never renewed, and seldom repaired, were at length unequal to the rough journey over the cobble stones, and crumbled to pieces on the way, expiring miserably in the cause of duty, from old age and unmerited neglect.

In the early part of 1859, a lifeboat, thirty feet in length, was stationed here by the National Lifeboat Institution, and in the month of September in the same year, a neat and substantial house was built for it on the beach opposite the North Euston Hotel. After doing good service along the coast, in rescuing several crews whose vessels had stranded amidst the breakers on the outlying sand-banks, this boat was superseded, in 1862, by one of larger dimensions. In January, 1863, the erection on the beach was swept away by the billows during a heavy gale, and in the course of a few months the present structure in Pharos Street, far removed from the reach of the destructive element, was raised, and the lifeboat transferred to its safer keeping.

The census of the residents taken in 1861 showed a total of 4,061 persons, being an increase of 940 over the number in 1851, and of 1,228 over that in 1841. Hence it is seen that during the long period of twenty years, almost from its commencement to the date now under consideration, through fluctuating seasons of prosperous and depressed trade, the town had succeeded in adding no more than 1,228 individuals to the roll of its inhabitants, many of whom would be the offspring of the original settlers. Truly the foregoing picture is not a very satisfactory one to review when we call to mind the bright auspices under which the place was started,—the early and ample railway accommodation, the short and well-beaconed channel, and the safe and spacious harbour; but could we only add the extensive area of docks, the Fleetwood of 1871 would doubtless have presented a widely different aspect to that we are here called upon to portray. It is scarcely just, however, to lay all the burden of this slow rate of progress on the want of suitable berth provision for heavily-laden vessels coming to the harbour. Fleetwood had other means of extending its circle besides those derived from its happy situation for shipping trade. Its merits as a watering-place were allowed on every hand; eulogistic versions of its special charms were circulated through the public prints; strangers flocked each summer to its shores, and were enchanted with their visits; but after a while the refreshing novelty wore off, and the puny efforts made by those whose interests in the prosperity of the town were greatest, failed to fill the inevitable void the waning newness left in its train. In the meantime other season places, urged on by emulation, enhanced the beauties of nature by works of art; promenades, walks, drives, and, at no distant period, piers, were constructed to meet the popular demands, and in that way the tide of visitors was turned from the non-progressive and now over familiar attractions of Fleetwood to swell the annually increasing streams which overflowed the rising towns of Blackpool and Lytham. The year 1861 will ever be remarkable in the history of Fleetwood as being the date at which the town was for the first time practically diverted from that line of progress which its founder, in too sanguine expectancy, had early marked out for it. Its decadence as a summer resort had been too pronounced to allow of any hope being entertained that a revulsion was probable, or even possible, in the feelings and tastes of the multitude, which would again people its shores, during the warm months, with a heterogeneous crowd of valetudinarians and pleasure-seekers. The noble hotel which had been erected by Sir P. H. Fleetwood on the northern margin of the shore, in a style of architecture and at an expense which bore witness to the firm confidence of the baronet in the brilliant future awaiting the infant town, had been sold to Government, as previously stated, in 1859, but it was not until two years afterwards that the first detachment of officers took up their quarters in the newly-established School of Musketry, and Fleetwood awoke to the novel sound of martial music and the reputation of being a military centre. Rumour, also, had for several months been active in circulating a report that the sward lying between the Landmark and the cemetery, and a field at the corner of Cemetery Road, had attracted the eye of Government as a suitable locality whereon to place barracks and lay out a rifle-practice ground; and in February, 1861, doubt on the subject was no longer admissible, for the contract to carry out the fresh project was let during that month to the gentleman who had been engaged in the necessary alterations at the North Euston Hotel. The scheme involved the creation of residential accommodation in the field just indicated for a small force of 220 men and 12 officers, some of the quarters being specially designed for married soldiers, in addition to which lavatories, a canteen, mess-room, magazine, and guard-house, were to be erected. The work was entered on without delay, and at no long interval, about ten months, or rather more, the whole of the buildings were completed, and soon afterwards occupied. The practice-ground was marked out for range firing, and butts provided, where the targets were shortly stationed. A spacious hospital, it should be mentioned, was constructed almost contemporaneously with the main portion of the barrack buildings.

On Monday, the 20th of May, 1861, a mass meeting was convened to ascertain the opinion of the inhabitants with regard to a claim of exclusive use of the road over the Mount-hill, which had recently been set up by Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, who in order to establish his right had caused a cobble wall to be erected round that portion of the estate. The meeting, consisting of about three hundred persons, was held on the pathway in dispute, which crosses the highest point of the elevation. A platform was raised, and a chairman, elected by the unanimous voice of the company, ascended the rostrum, being accompanied by several of the more enthusiastic advocates of free-road, who in the course of earnest addresses declared that for twenty years the Mount had been dedicated to the public service, in consideration of certain sums paid annually to the lord of the manor out of the town’s rates, and that having been so long the property of the people, Sir P. H. Fleetwood had now no moral or legal title to wrest it from them. The ardent language of the speakers aroused a sympathetic feeling in the breasts of the small multitude, and murmurs of discontent at the attempted deprivation of their privileges had already assumed a threatening tone, when a gentleman who happened to be visiting the neighbourhood, appeared upon the scene, and in a few spirited words urged the excited listeners to some speedy manifestation of their disapproval. Uttering a shout of indignation and defiance the crowd rushed at the enclosure wall, tore down the masonry, and quickly opened out a wide breach through the offending structure, after which they filled the air with triumphant cheers and shortly retired homewards in a comparatively orderly manner. In the course of a few months the vexatious question was settled between the representatives of the town and Sir P. H. Fleetwood, who on his part agreed only to retain to himself a plot of land fifty yards square, lying on the west side of the hill; another piece one hundred yards square, extending from the base of the elevation to the sea; the wooden edifice on the summit of the mound; six square yards whereon to erect a look-out house for the Coastguards; and the gardens and cottage-lodges at the entrance. The remainder of the Mount, amounting to about three-fourths, was given up to the public, together with the right of footway through the cottages just mentioned, and over the east and west plots; the commissioners engaging, on their side, to erect and maintain a suitable fence round the Mount, and to keep the hill itself in a proper manner for the benefit of the inhabitants or visitors, as well as binding themselves upon no account to raise any building on the site. The entire ground, with the buildings, has since been given, on much the same conditions, to the town.

During the year 1862 the town, which for some time had lain dormant in a commercial point of view, evinced unmistakable signs of returning animation; trade was more active, rumour once more hinted at the probable commencement of docks at an early date, and ninety-five houses of moderate size were erected. In the earlier half of the following twelve months no less than thirty-seven more dwellings were added to the town, the foundations of several others being in course of preparation. A branch of the Preston Banking Company was also opened for a few hours once in each week; and during later years has transacted business daily.

On Tuesday, the 20th of January, 1863, a storm and flood, such as has seldom been witnessed on this coast, arose suddenly and raged with fury for about twenty hours. The whole of the wall under the Mount, which had been brought to light by some gales in the previous November, after having been buried in the sand for long, was utterly demolished, not one stone being left upon another. In addition, the breakers penetrated with destructive violence, several yards inland beyond the line of that barrier throughout its whole length, from the west end of the Euston Barracks to the further extremity of Abbot’s Walk. A wooden battery of two 32-pound guns at the foot of the Mount, belonging to the Coastguards,[85] and used for training the Naval Volunteer Reserve, was undermined and so tilted that its removal became a necessity. The marine fence, which had been constructed at an immense cost, between the Landmark and Cleveleys, was almost entirely swept away, leaving the adjacent country open to the inundations of the sea, which rushed over and flooded all the land between the points just named, extending eastward even to the embankment of the Preston and Wyre Railway. Several of the streets at the west side of Fleetwood were under water, as also were the fields about Poulton road and the highway itself. The proprietor of the “Strawberry Garden,” off the same road, and his family, were compelled to take refuge in an upper storey of their dwelling until rescued in a boat, the following day, from their unpleasant, if not perilous, position. It was in this hurricane that the house erected on the shore for the reception of the lifeboat suffered annihilation, and the boat itself narrowly escaped serious damage. Tuesday, the 10th of March, in the same year was observed by the residents as a general holiday and gala day, in honour of the marriage of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, with the Danish Princess, Alexandra. Flags and banners floated from the windows of nearly every habitation, as well as from the roofs of many, while the steamships and other vessels in the harbour were gaily decorated with bunting, which waved in rich and varied tints from their masts, spars, and rigging. Triumphal arches of the “colours of all nations” were suspended across the streets at several points. A large procession of schools and friendly societies in full regalia, with their banners and devices, paraded the different thoroughfares, and were afterwards sumptuously entertained, the latter at their various lodges, and the former in the large area of a cotton warehouse, recently built on the quay by Messrs. B. Whitworth and Bros., of Manchester. The military stationed at the School of Musketry evinced their loyalty by discharging a feu de joie on the warren. In the following November a scheme was proposed for the construction of a coast railway between Fleetwood and Blackpool, to pass through Rossall and Bispham. A survey was made of the route, and according to the plans drawn out, the projected line was intended to have its Fleetwood terminus at the south extremity of Poulton Terrace, opposite the end of West Street, whence it was to run towards the new barracks, near the cemetery, then diverge to the south in the direction of Rossall. From Rossall its course lay towards Bispham and thence onwards to the Blackpool terminus, which would be located in Queen’s street, adjoining the station already standing there. The stations, besides those at the two termini, were to be placed at the barracks, Rossall, and Bispham. At Fleetwood the promoters proposed to form a junction with the Preston and Wyre Railway near the old timber pond, for the purpose of passing carriages from one line to the other, whilst at Blackpool a similar object would be effected with the Lytham and Blackpool Railway by deviating eastward from Queen Street, so as to avoid the town, and establishing a junction with the latter line near Chapel Street. On an application being made to parliament for powers to carry out the design, strenuous opposition was offered by the representatives of the Preston and Wyre Railway, who pledged themselves to erect additional stations along their track to accommodate the people residing at Rossall, Cleveleys, and Bispham, in consequence of which the bill for a coast-line was thrown out and the project abandoned.

On the 4th of December, 1863, the Lancaster Banking Company established a branch here; and on the 15th of that month the Whitworth Institute in Dock Street was publicly opened. This handsome Hall was erected through the munificence of Benjamin Whitworth, esq., M.P., of London, who for long resided at Fleetwood, and during that period, and afterwards, was instrumental in giving a marked stimulus to the foreign trade of the port by shipping each year, on behalf of the large firm of which he is the head at Manchester, numerous cargoes of cotton from America viâ Fleetwood. The building is in the Gothic style of architecture. The walls are built of bricks with stone dressings, the principal features being the ten arcaded windows, with the stone balcony beneath running across the entire width of the front, and the elegant entrance. The interior comprises a spacious reading room and library, a smoking and coffee room, provided with chess and draughts, an assembly room, capable of containing 400 persons, and two billiard rooms. At the time of its presentation to the inhabitants the donor generously provided tea urns and other appliances necessary for holding soirees, in addition to having liberally furnished the whole of the building, including the gift of a choice and extensive selection of books, chess and draught-men, a bagatelle-board, and a billiard-table. The second billiard-table was added out of the surplus funds in 1875. The Institute is vested in trustees for the use of the town, and governed by a committee chosen from amongst the subscribers.

During 1864-5 building continued to progress, but not with that great rapidity which had characterised its advance in 1862 and the earlier months of the following year. An act of parliament was granted in 1864 to certain gentlemen for the formation of a dock in connection with the harbour, confirming the rumour which had now agitated the place for the last two years, and bringing conviction to the hearts of many of the older inhabitants, whose past experience had taught them to look with eyes of distrust on all reports which pointed to such a happy realisation of their youthful dreams. The inaugural ceremony of breaking the turf did not, however, take place for some time, and will be noticed shortly. On the 17th of May, 1866, the foundation stone of the present Roman Catholic church in East Street was laid by Doctor Goss, bishop of Liverpool, who performed the ceremony, attired in full ecclesiastical robes, and attended by a numerous retinue of priests and choristers. The sacred edifice was opened on Sunday, the 24th of November in the ensuing year. Its general style is early English of the 13th century. The building consists of a nave and two aisles, with an apsidal sanctuary at the east end; it is about one hundred feet long, thirty-five feet wide, and fifty feet in height. The exterior is built of stone, the body of the walls being Yorkshire parpoints, whilst the dressings are of Longridge stone. Mr. T. A. Drummond, of Fleetwood, was the builder, and the design was drawn by E. Welby Pugin, esq., architect, the total cost being about £4,000.

For many years, in fact ever since steamship communication had been established between this port and Belfast, large quantities of young cattle from Ireland were landed each season at Fleetwood, and carried forward by rail to the markets of Preston and elsewhere. For the benefit of the dealers, who would thus escape the railway charges, as well as for the convenience of the graziers and other purchasers residing in the neighbourhood, it was determined to open a place for the public sale of such live stock at Fleetwood; the necessary authority was obtained from the Privy Council, and on the 2nd of April, 1868, the Cattle Market, lying on the east side of that for general produce, and consisting of sixteen large strong pens, arranged in two rows with a road between them, was used for its earliest transactions and much appreciated by those who were concerned in the traffic.

Wednesday, the 2nd of June, 1869, will not readily be obliterated from the memories of the people of Fleetwood. On that day the first sod of the long expected dock was cut by H. S. Styan, esq., of London, the surviving trustee of the estate under the will of the late Sir P. H. Fleetwood, who died in 1866. The auspicious event was celebrated with universal rejoicing, in which many-coloured bunting played its usual conspicuous part. A large procession of the clergy, gentry, schools, and friendly societies, enlivened by the band of the 80th regiment of Infantry from the Euston Barracks, and gay with waving banners, accompanied Mr. Styan to the site where the important ceremony was performed, and sent forth hearty congratulatory cheers when the piece of turf had been duly dissected from the ground. With all apparent earnestness and eagerness, operations were at once commenced, and for two or three months the undertaking, under the busy hands of the excavators, made satisfactory progress, when suddenly several gangs of labourers were discharged, and the works partially stopped—

“While all the town wondered.”

Wonderment, however, was turned to a feeling of disappointment and chagrin, when it was discovered, a little later, that the closing year would put a period to the labours at the dock as well as to its own epoch of time, and that its last shadows would fall on deserted works and idle machinery. For some reason, which may fairly be conjectured to have been an incompleted list of shareholders, the Fleetwood Dock Company determined to suspend all operations barely six months after they had been begun, and it is scarcely necessary to inform our readers that the work was never resumed under the same proprietorship. Two years subsequently, in 1871, the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company obtained an act of parliament to carry out, on a larger scale, the undertaking which their predecessors had abandoned almost in its birth. The dock, which embraces an area of nearly ten acres, being one thousand feet long, by four hundred feet wide, has already been in course of formation for more than two years, and although the labour is being pushed forward by the contractors, Messrs. John Aird and Sons, of Lambeth, with as much expedition as is consistent with good workmanship, the completion of this much-needed accommodation is not expected until some time in 1877. The dock walls are built with square blocks of stone, surmounted by a broad and massive coping of Cornish granite, and filled in behind with concrete, the whole having an altitude of thirty-one feet, and being placed on a solid concrete foundation fourteen feet wide. The walls themselves vary in width as they approach the surface, being in the lower half of their distance 12½ feet, then 10½ feet, and in the highest section 8½ feet wide. The lock entrance communicates with the north extremity of the dock, and is two hundred and fifty feet long by fifty feet wide, being protected at each end by gates, opening, respectively, into the dock and the channel now in process of excavation to the bed of the river Wyre. Lying to the south of the dock is the recently-constructed timber pond, covering an area of 14½ or 15 acres, and having a depth of 15 feet. The pond is connected with the dock by means of a gateway, so arranged in the southern wall of the latter that two feet of water will always remain in the former after the tide has ebbed below the level of its floor. The timber pond has no other entrance beyond the one alluded to. Sir John Hawkshaw, previously mentioned in connection with the visit of Queen Victoria to Fleetwood, is the eminent engineer from whose designs the dock is being constructed.

The prospect, or indeed certainty, of materially increased trade when the dock is thrown open has not been without effect upon the town generally, but its stimulating influence is most remarkable in the large number of houses which, during the last few years, have sprung into being. Streets have been lined with habitations where recently not a dwelling existed, and others have had their vacant spaces filled in with buildings. Handsome shops have been erected in Dock Street, East and West Streets, and other localities, whilst many of the residences in Church Street have been remodeled and converted into similar retail establishments. Everywhere there is a spirit of activity visible, contrasting most pleasingly and favourably with the passive inertitia which pervaded the place for a considerable period previous to the commencement of the dock operations. In 1875 the commissioners determined to do something towards protecting the northern aspect of the Mount from the devastations of the waves, whose boisterous familiarity had already inflicted serious injury on its feeble sandy sides, and seemed disposed, if much longer unchecked, to reduce the venerable pile to a mere matter of history. A public promenade, fenced with a substantial wall of concrete, was laid out at the base of the hill, extending from near the west extremity of the Mount Terrace to the commencement of Abbot’s Walk. The damaged side of the mound itself has been levelled and sown with grass-seed, so that in course of time the marine walk will have a lofty sloping background of green sward, and form the prettiest, as it was doubtless the most needed, object in the neighbourhood.

On the 1st of January, 1875, a number of gentlemen, denominated the Fleetwood Estate Company, Limited, and consisting of Sir Jno. Hawkshaw, knt., of Westminster; Thos. H. Carr, J. M. Jameson, C.E., and Philip Turner, esqrs., of Fleetwood; Capt. Henry Turner and Sturges Meek, esq., C.E., of Manchester; Thomas Barnes, esq., of Farnworth; James Whitehead, esq., of Preston; Joshua Radcliffe, esq., of Rochdale; Samuel Burgess, esq., of Altringham; William Barber Buddicom, esq., C.E., of Penbedw, Mold; and Samuel Fielden, esq., of Todmorden; purchased the lands, buildings, manorial rights and privileges (including wreckage, market-tolls, and advowson of the church), of the late Sir P. H. Fleetwood, in and near this town, from the trustees of his property, for £120,000, subscribed in equal shares. Although negotiations were satisfactorily concluded in 1874, it was not until the month just stated that the actual transfer was effected, and the gentlemen enumerated became lords of the soil. We must not omit to name that a portion of the Fleetwood estate, amounting to about 600 acres, lying between the old and present railway embankments, had been acquired in a similar manner, for £25,000, in 1871, by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company. Under the new proprietorship leases for building purposes are sold or let, as formerly, for terms of 999 years.

In closing this account of Fleetwood as a watering-place and town, and before delineating its career as a seaport, it should be stated that the census of the inhabitants taken in 1871 yielded a total of 4,428 persons, of whom 2,310 were males, and 2,118 females; but in the limited period which has elapsed since that result was obtained the population has grown considerably, and the increase during a similar interval after any of the previous official returns cannot be taken as a criterion of the present numerical strength of the residents.

Fleetwood was started in 1839 as a distinct port with customs established by an order of the Treasury; subsequently in 1844 it was reduced to a creek under Preston; then two years later elevated to a sub-port; and finally in 1849 reinstated in its first position of independence. The iron wharf was completed in 1841, and is constructed of iron piles, each of which weighs two and three quarter tons, driven seventeen feet below low water mark, and faced with plates of the same metal, seven or eight inches thick, which are rivetted to the flanges of the piles, and filled in at the back with concrete. The wooden pier, about 400 feet in length, and abutting on the north extremity of this massive structure, was finished in 1845, and roofed over shortly afterwards. On the 22nd of July in the ensuing year, the last stone of the wharf wall, erected by Mr. Julian A. Tarner, of Fleetwood, and extending fourteen hundred feet from the south end of the iron wharf in the direction of the railway, was laid; and at the same time the coal-shoots connected with the new portion of the quay were approaching completion.

The improvement of the harbour was entrusted to Captain Denham, R.N., F.R.S., under whose superintendence the seaward channel of the river was buoyed and beaconed, being rendered safe for night navigation by the erection of a marine lighthouse, in 1840, at the foot of Wyre, nearly two miles from the mouth of the river at Fleetwood. This lighthouse was the first one erected on Mitchell’s screw-pile principle. The house in which the lightkeepers lived was hexagonal in form, and measured 22 feet in diameter, from angle to angle, and nine feet in height. It was furnished with an outside door and three windows; and divided within into two compartments, one of which was supplied with a fireplace and other necessaries, whilst the second was used purely as a dormitory. The lantern was twelve-sided, 10 feet in diameter and 8 feet in height to the top of the window, the illumination it produced being raised about 31 feet above the level of the highest spring-tide, and 44½ feet above that of half-tide. A few years since, in 1870, this lighthouse was carried away by a vessel, and for some time a light-ship occupied the station, but subsequently another edifice, similar in appearance and construction to the original one, was raised about two hundred yards south of the same site.

Captain Denham, having accomplished his survey of the river and harbour, issued the following report in 1840:—

“The river Wyre assumes a river character near Bleasdale Forest, in Lancashire, and after crossing the line of road between Preston and Lancaster, at Garstang, descends as a tortuous stream for five miles westward; then, in another five mile reach of one-third of a mile wide, north-westward, sweeping the light of Skippool, near Poulton-le-Fylde, on its way, and bursting forth from the narrows at Wardleys, upon a north trend, into the tidal estuary which embraces an area of three miles by two, producing a combined reflux of back-water, equal to fifty million cubical yards, and dipping with such a powerful under-scour during the first half-ebb, as to preserve a natural basin just within its coast-line orifice, capable of riding ships of eighteen or twenty feet draft, at low water spring tides; perfectly sheltered from all winds, and within a cable’s length of the railway terminus, nineteen miles from Preston, and in connection with Manchester, Lancaster, Liverpool, and London. It is on the western margin of this natural dock that the town, wharfs, and warehouses are rising into notice, under the privilege of a distinct port, and abreast of which, the shores aptly narrow the back-water escape into a bottle-neck strait of but one-sixth the width of the estuary, so impelling it down a two-mile channel as scarcely to permit diminishment of its three and four-mile velocity until actually blended with the cross-set of the Lune and Morecambe Bay ebb waters. Thus, the original short course of Wyre to the open sea, is freed from the usual river deposit, its silting matter being kept in suspension until transferred and hurried forth at right angles by the ocean stream. It is, therefore, the peculiar feature and fortune of Wyre that, instead of a bar intervening between its bed or exit trough and the open sea, a precipitous river shelf, equal to a fall of forty-seven feet in one-third of a mile, exists.”

The first steam dredger, of 20 horse power, was launched on the 21st of January, 1840, and the important work of deepening and clearing the channel at once commenced.

At a meeting of the Tidal Harbour Commissioners held at the port on the 21st October, 1845, it was stated that the harbour dues were—for coasting vessels, 1d. per ton, and for foreign ships, 3d. per ton; whilst the light charges were in all cases 3d. per ton. At the same time it was observed that the whole of the dues amounted in 1835 to £36 2s. 0d., and in 1845 to £528 9s. 5d. (In 1855 the dues on similar accounts reached £1,520; and in 1875, £2,427.) The Walney light was reported to be a great tax on vessels coming to Fleetwood, as they were charged 3d. a ton per year, commencing on the 1st of January; so that if a vessel arrived at the port on the 28th of December, a charge was made for the year just closing, and a further sum demanded from the craft on going out in the month of January. This was not the case with regard to similar taxes in other localities, where one payment exempted a ship for twelve months; and consequently the regulation acted in some degree as a deterrent to traders, who might under a more liberal arrangement have been induced to have availed themselves in larger numbers of the facilities offered by the new haven. The total length of useful wharfage in 1845 extended over 1,000 feet, being well supplied with posts and rings, and possessing no less than sixteen hand cranes, thirteen of which were for the purpose of unloading vessels at the quay. There was a depth of five feet at low-water spring tides from the marine lighthouse, at the foot of Wyre, to the wharf, and it was proposed to dredge until ten feet had been obtained.

On examining the state of the shipping trade of the harbour during the year 1845, it is discovered that the imports and exports of foreign produce and home manufacture, respectively, far outstripped those of any of the few preceding years. There had been vessels laden with guano from Ichaboe, sugar from the West Indies, flax from Russia, and timber from both the Baltic and Canada, making in all twenty-three ships of large tonnage, only two of which returned with cargoes, in far from complete stages of fulness, from the warehouses of Manchester, Preston, or other adjacent commercial towns. The coasting trade had also given earnest of its progressive tendencies by a remarkable increase in the number of discharges and loadings over those of the previous twelve months, and notwithstanding the four hundred feet of extra wharfage, forming the wooden pier, just opened, the demands for quay berths could not always be supplied.

New bonding warehouses were erected towards the close of 1845 at the corner of Adelaide and Dock Streets, the temporary ones previously in use being abandoned, and comprised three stories capable of providing accommodation for 400 hogsheads of sugar at one time, as well as spacious vaults and other conveniences for duty-bearing articles. The goods allowed to be warehoused were wine, spirits, tea, tobacco, East India goods, and goods in general.

In 1846 prosperity continued to reward the efforts put forth by the authorities of the young haven. Twelve vessels arrived from America with timber, and nine similarly laden from the Baltic; tobacco, sugar, and other commodities were imported in two ships from the Indies; but the event which kindled the brightest anticipations in the breasts of the inhabitants and others interested in the success of the port was the arrival of the barque “Diogenes,” chartered by Mr. Evans, of Chipping, with the first cargo of cotton ever landed at Fleetwood. In it was welcomed an introduction to the chief trade of the county, and a happy augury of future activity in an import which would not only of itself materially assist the financial condition of the harbour, but would also be the means of spreading its reputation throughout the commercial world, and extending its field of action to a degree which could scarcely be foretold. How these pleasant visions have been fulfilled the reader is perhaps aware, but if not a glance at the tables of coasting and foreign trade, given a little later, will furnish the necessary information. On the 12th of February, immediately the novel consignment just referred to, which “afforded a suitable opportunity,” had come to hand, a public dinner was given by their fellow-townsmen to Frederick Kemp and John Laidlay, esqrs., as a mark of respect for their assiduous efforts to develope the mercantile resources of the place. During the evening Mr. Laidlay remarked that “within a short period the trading intercourse of the port had extended to various and distant portions of the world, the products of Africa, the West Indies, and North America having been imported; and stretching our arm still further, a cargo from the East Indies may be stated as almost within our grasp.” Mr. Evans, in alluding to his transatlantic shipment, affirmed that in bringing it by way of Fleetwood, he had effected a saving of at least a farthing per pound; and continued,—“When the order was given, it could not have been imported into Liverpool without loss.”

In the latter part of the year a testimonial was presented by the inhabitants of the town to Henry Smith, esq., of Fleetwood, manager of the North Lancashire Steam Navigation Company, as a tribute to his untiring and successful attempts to promote steamship traffic and advance the interests of the place, and in the course of a speech made on the occasion, Mr. Smith said:—“In 1842 I first visited Fleetwood at the request of the London board of directors, it then presented a most gloomy aspect—a splendid modern ruin, no shipping, no steamers, no passengers for the trains, and yet it required no very keen discernment to learn that all the facilities for trade and commerce existed here, but life was wanting; here was one of the finest and safest harbours, certainly the best lighted and marked port on the west coast, being as easily made by night as by day, with that wonderful natural phenomenon, the Lune Deep, making it a safety port to take in fog by sounding—a thing having no parallel in England.... What changes have we witnessed here since 1842? I have seen your population without employment, and now there is more work than there are hands to perform—the wages from one shilling a day have advanced to two shillings and sixpence and three shillings; then indeed was your port without a ship, now there is a general demand for more quay room, although since then upwards of 1,000 feet have been added to the wharfage; then your railway receipts were £100, this year they have attained £1,500 per week.” This unfortunate gentleman was killed in the June following, through a collision on the London and North Western Railway; and there can be no hesitation in affirming that, had his career of usefulness and activity not been thus prematurely cut short, the trade of Fleetwood would have developed, in the long period which has elapsed since his death, into something more important than it presents to day.

The following authentic returns of the whole business of the port in 1846 forms a favourable comparison with those of 1840, the year in which the railway was opened, when they amounted to 57,051 tons of imports, the exports being proportionately small:—

COASTING.

The animated appearance of the harbour was described in 1846 by a gentleman connected with the town, as here quoted:—“With two Indiamen at their berths, the splendid steamers alongside, schooners, small craft innumerable dotting the river, wharfmen, porters, etc., removing merchandise from vessel to wagon, and vice versa, the cranes in constant operation, goods-trains arriving and preparing for departure, give the pier-head and harbour an air of bustle and activity, and are themselves a pleasing indication of what our commerce may become; of the trade which vigilance, patience, and effort, may secure to the harbour and railway.”

The twelve months of 1847 proved anything but a re-assuring time. The foreign imports suddenly fell off to six cargoes, four of which were timber from America, the two remaining being guano and timber from Hamburg. One left for Mexico and Hong Kong, laden with British goods, silk, wine, and spirits from the bonding warehouses. The coasting returns also showed a diminution of almost fifty discharges at the quay, as compared with the previous year, and a corresponding decrease in the exports; but in spite of the sudden dispiriting experience, we find from the annexed extract out of the annual official report concerning the harbour, that the future was regarded hopefully:—“There is every probability of the business increasing at this Port, as an extensive trade with the Baltic is expected, and most of the goods now in warehouse under bond will no doubt be taken out for home consumption during the present year.” 1848 was marked by an increase of nine in the number of foreign importations; and of the fifteen large vessels which arrived, one was from France with wines and spirits for re-exportation to Mexico, two were from the Baltic and Hamburg with timber, eleven from Canada with timber, and one from Russia with flax. The importers of timber carried on, and used sedulous efforts to extend, a healthy retail trade in the adjoining districts and in the west of Yorkshire. The export trade was still inconsiderable, although gradually increasing, but it was expected, from the convenient situation of the harbour to the manufacturing towns, and the local dues upon vessels and goods being much lower than at other ports, that both it and the imports would, before many years had passed over, become very extensive, more especially as the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company had recently acquired a right to the line between Fleetwood and Preston, and were offering every facility and inducement to shippers and manufacturers, with the view of making this haven the inlet and outlet for goods to and from the towns and villages on their several lines. During the twelve months eighteen small importations of paper from the Isle of Man took place, and it was necessary for the officers connected with the customs to keep a strict guard upon the wharf to prevent the smuggling of that and other dutiable articles by the numerous passenger and coasting vessels from the above island, as well as from Scotland and Ireland.

In 1849 the foreign imports were more than doubled, the excess being chiefly due to the increase of timber-laden vessels. Six of the total number sailed outwards with cargoes of warehoused goods, and nine with coal and salt. The coasting trade underwent a most remarkable rise of about four hundred cargoes inwards, and two hundred outwards, the principal of the former being iron ore, pig iron, and, more occasionally, grain; and of the latter, coal. The barque “Isabella” discharged 609 bales of cotton at Fleetwood from America in July, 1850, being the second cargo landed here, and later in the year another consignment of 400 bales was brought by the same vessel. In 1851 the only novel feature was the arrival of a large shipload of currants; the value of British goods exported amounted to £90,000, besides which there were considerable quantities of merchandise sent outwards from bond. The main foreign business in 1852 was in timber and dried fruits, but such importations were seriously diminished during the ensuing year by the high price of the latter and by a temporary misunderstanding between the railway company and one of the chief timber merchants, through which several consignments intended for the Wyre were diverted elsewhere; in addition five large cargoes were lost at sea and not replaced. The coasting trade continued to expand until 1856, when its zenith was reached, since when it has been characterised by a gradual decline, and the last report, that of 1875, is as little encouraging as any, with one exception, of its degenerate predecessors. The fourth freight of cotton, consisting of 1,327 bales, made its appearance in the ship “Cleopatra,” in the spring of 1857, and was consigned to Messrs. Benjamin Whitworth and Brothers, of Manchester, etc. Shortly afterwards, barely two weeks, the “Favourite” arrived with a further consignment for the same firm, and gave the signal for the real commencement of a prosperous trade in that commodity with America, which rapidly developed until the outbreak of civil war in the transatlantic continent brought it somewhat abruptly to a close in 1862. In a comparative statement of charges between Liverpool and Fleetwood, issued during that flourishing time, it was demonstrated that on a vessel of 500 tons, cotton in and coals out, the following saving in favour of this port could be effected:—

Supposing the cargo to have been consigned to parties in Preston, a further advantage, amounted to £230 0s. 0d. in carriage would be gained, raising the entire saving to £400 15s. 0d.

During late years, the business firm just alluded to, whose interests in, and efforts for, the welfare of the port have so long been unflagging, has made a vigorous attempt to revive the American cotton importations. For the last few seasons several of their shipments, about ten, have annually arrived, and there is every prospect that when the dock is completed many more vessels will be chartered. A large shed for the reception of cotton was erected in 1875, in Adelaide Street, by Messrs. B. Whitworth and Bros., who have also established a permanent office in the town.

In 1859 the trade between Fleetwood and Belfast had developed to such an extent that a larger covered area for the temporary warehousing, loading, and discharging of goods was urgently called for, and towards the close of that year a space of about 190 feet in length, by 30 feet wide, was walled in and roofed over on the quay, adjoining the building then in use for the same purposes. Four years later, in 1863, two steam cranes were placed on the wharf by the North Lancashire Steam Navigation Company. Subsequently other cranes, working on a similar principle, have been added to those experimental ones, and gradually the old system of hand-labour at the quay-side has been superseded by the adoption of this more expeditious and economical plan. Shortly before the last-named facilities had augmented the conveniences of the wharf, a fresh description of mooring appliance was laid down in the harbour, and consisted of two longitudinal ground chains of 1,000 feet each, attached at intervals of 50 feet to two sets of Mitchell’s screws, which were worked into the clay in the bed of the stream. The bridle chains, shackled above to the mooring buoys, were secured below to the ground links between the attachments of the screws, the buoys being so arranged that each vessel was held stem and stern, instead of swinging round with the tide, or stranding with one end on the large central sandbank, as heretofore.

From 1862 to the present date, the story of the haven, with the exceptions of the trawling fleet and the Belfast line, which will be treated of directly, is not one which will awaken envy in the breasts of those whose interests are bound up in rival ports, nor indeed can it be a source of congratulation to those whose interests might ordinarily be supposed to be best promoted by its prosperity. It is true that the foreign trade for seven years after 1862 was in a state of fluctuation rather than actual decline, but the three succeeding years were stationary at the low figure of 21 imports each, after which there was a slight improvement, raising the annual numbers to 24, 32, and, in 1875, 33, due more to the staunch allegiance of Messrs. B. Whitworth and Bros., whose cotton again appeared on the wharf, than to any inducements offered to them or others by increased facilities or more appropriate accommodation. The coasting trade has already been referred to, so that there is no necessity to recapitulate facts but just laid before our readers. It is proper, however, to mention a few statistics respecting the trade in exports of coal, the chief business, and below are given the numbers of tons shipped, mostly to Ireland, in each of the specified years:—

The large and sudden increase from 1869 is mainly owing to several screw steamships having been extensively engaged in the traffic, and there is every probability, from the addition within the last few months of a new and handsome coal-screw, and other indications, that this branch of commerce will continue to develope with equal, if not greater, rapidity. Again, it should be remembered, when considering the falling off in the numerical strength of the coasting vessels trading here, that those now plying are of much greater carrying capacity than formerly, and consequently the actual exports and imports have not suffered diminution in anything like the same proportion as the ships themselves. A series of tabular statements of all the most important and interesting matters connected with the harbour from the earliest obtainable dates has been prepared from the official returns made to the custom-house during each twelve months, and subjoined will be found a list of the vessels retained on the register as belonging to the port at the end of the years indicated, with their tonnages and the number of hands forming the crews:—

The foregoing tables, taken by themselves, would seem to imply that from the year 1868, the business of the place had been characterised by a rapid and most satisfactory increase, but unfortunately for such a deduction, the ships registered as belonging to any port afford no clue to the number actually engaged in traffic there, hence it happens that many vessels hailing from Fleetwood, as their maternal port, are seldom to be observed in its waters.

The following are the annual records of the foreign and coasting trade of the harbour, in which the Belfast and all other steamships are included under the latter heading:—

VESSELS WITH CARGOES.

The particulars given below, concerning the vessels belonging to Fleetwood, will form an interesting and useful accompaniment to the foregoing:—

Now that the dock is no longer a mere word and promise, but has at length a definite signification and a material existence, there is every appearance that those into whose hands the fortunes of the port may be said to have been entrusted have no intention of any dilatory action in furthering the interests of their charge. Already, in 1875, a powerful steam dredger has been purchased at a cost of £12,000 and set to its labours in the channel and harbour. This dredger, which has superseded the older and much smaller one, launched in 1840 and used until recently, was built by Simonds and Company, of Renfrew, on the Clyde, and is of 100-horse power, being capable of raising 250 tons of sand, shingle, etc., in an hour. In addition it is able to work in twenty-six feet of water, whereas the original one was obliged to wait until the tide had ebbed to fourteen feet before operations could be commenced, so that really the work which can be accomplished by the new machine is out of all proportion to that which its predecessor could effect. Several iron pontoons, or lighters, furnished with false bottoms to expedite the business of discharging them, formerly performed by hand and spade, have also been obtained; and the bed of the river seaward from Fleetwood is rapidly being relieved of its superabundance of tidal deposits and scourings, which is carried by the lighters beyond the marine lighthouse at the foot of the Wyre and deposited in the Lune.

Steamboat traffic was, and is, the most important branch of shipping connected with the port, but notwithstanding the support and encouragement which has been so freely extended to the Belfast line, sundry attempts by the same company to establish sea-communications between Fleetwood and other places have invariably ended in complete failures. In the context we have endeavoured to trace a brief outline of the steamship trade of the harbour from its earliest days up to our time. The North Lancashire Steam Navigation Company was established in 1843, and commenced operations by running the “Prince of Wales” and the “Princess Alice,” two large and fast iron steamships for that date, between this port and Belfast on each Wednesday and Saturday evening, the return trips being made on the Monday and Friday. In that year, however, the number of trips was increased to three per week, the fares for the single journey being, saloon, 15s.; and deck, 3s. Another steamship the “Robert Napier,” of 220 horse-power, sailed also from Fleetwood in 1843, every Friday morning, at 10 a.m. for Londonderry, calling at Portrush, and returned on Tuesday, the fares being, cabin, 20s.; and deck, 5s. In 1844 we find that communications, through the exertion and enterprise of the above company, were open between Fleetwood and Belfast, Londonderry, Ardrossan, and Dublin, respectively. The Ardrossan line consisted of two new iron steamboats, “Her Majesty,” and the “Royal Consort,” each of which was 300 tons register, and 350 horse-power, the fares being, cabin, 17s.; and deck, 4s. The Dublin trip was performed once, and afterwards twice, a week each way, by the iron steamship “Hibernia,” which called off Douglas, Isle of Man, to land passengers, but after a year’s trial this communication was closed. In the summer of 1845, an Isle of Man line was opened by the steamship “Orion,” which ran daily, except Sundays; and at the same season the Belfast boats commenced to make the double journey four days a week, whilst the Londonderry route was abandoned. As early as 1840, on the completion of the Preston and Wyre Railway, a daily steam communication had been established to Bardsea, as the nearest point to Ulverston and the Lakes; and in the month of September, 1846, on the completion of Piel Pier, it was transferred to that harbour, and continued by the steamship “Ayrshire Lassie,” of 100 horse-power, the fares being, saloon, 2s.; and deck, 1s. In the following year this boat was superseded by a new steamer, the “Helvellyn,” of 50 tons register and 75 horse-power, which continued to ply for many years, in fact, almost until this summer line was closed, at a comparatively recent date, about eight or ten years ago. The Fleetwood and Ardrossan steamers discontinued running in 1847, and at the same time an extra boat, the “Fenella,” was placed on the Isle of Man route, whilst the Belfast trips were reduced to three double journeys per week. After a few years experience the Isle of Man line, a season one only, was given up; but the Belfast trade, continually growing, soon obliged the company to increase the number of trips, and step by step to enlarge and improve the boat accommodation. We need not trace through its different stages the gradual and satisfactory progress of this line, but our object will be sufficiently attained by stating that the two steamships were shortly increased to three. Afterwards larger and finer boats, having greater power, took the places of the original ones, and at the present day the fleet consists of four fine steamers of fully double the capacity of the original ones, which cross the channel from each port every evening except Sunday.

In the year 1874 the whole of the interests of Frederick Kemp, esq., J.P., of Bispham Lodge, in the Fleetwood and Belfast steam line were acquired by the Lancashire and Yorkshire and London and North Western Railway Companies, at that time owners of the larger share, and now practically sole proprietors. Up to the date of this transaction the vendor had been intimately and personally associated with the traffic as managing-owner from its first institution, in addition to which he was the chief promoter of the Ardrossan and Isle of Man routes.

With the solitary exception of the service whose progress has just been briefly traced out, there is perhaps no single branch of industry which has assisted so ably in maintaining and stimulating such prosperity as the town of Fleetwood has enjoyed, throughout its chequered career, as the fishing traffic. In the earliest years of the seaport, shortly before the Belfast steamer communication was established, a second pilot boat, named the “Pursuit,” arrived in the river from Cowes, but finding little occupation the crew provided themselves with a trawl-net and turned their long periods of vigil to profitable account by its use. This sensible plan of launching out into another field of labour when opportunities of prosecuting their more legitimate avocation failed them was not of long duration, probably no more than a few months, for on the Irish line of steamships commencing to ply the pilots secured berths as second officers, and their boat was laid up. The “Pursuit” soon became a tender to a government ship engaged in surveying; and about ten or twelve months later was purchased by some gentlemen, denominated the Fleetwood Fishing Company, and, together with four more boats, hired from North Meols, Southport, sent out on fishing excursions. At the end of one year the hired sloops were discharged, and five similar craft bought by the company, thus making a fleet of six smacks belonging to the place, connected with the trawling trade. In the course of three or four years the whole of the boats were sold, as the traffic had not proved so remunerative a venture as at first anticipated; and one only remained in the harbour, being purchased by Mr. Robert Roskell, of this place. Shortly afterwards a Scotch smack arrived from Kirkcudbright, and in about twelve months the two boats were joined by three or four from North Meols, owned for the most part by a family named Leadbetter, which settled here. Almost simultaneously another batch of fishing craft made its appearance from the east coast and took up a permanent station at Fleetwood. The success which attended the expeditions of the deep-sea trawlers was not long in being rumoured abroad and attracting others, who were anxious to participate in an undertaking capable of producing such satisfactory results. Year by year the dimensions of the originally small fleet were developed as new-comers appeared upon the scene, and added their boats to those already actively prosecuting the trade. To trace minutely each gradation in the prosperous progress of this line of commerce would be wearisome to the reader, and is in no way necessary to the object we have in view. It will be sufficient for the purpose to state that in 1860 the number of fishing smacks on the Fleetwood station amounted to thirty-two, varying in tonnage from 25 to 50 tons each and built at an average cost of £500 each, the lowest being £400 and the highest £1,000. The following will illustrate the plan by which men in the humble sphere of fishermen were enabled to become the proprietors of their own craft: A shipmaster supplied the vessel on the understanding that £100 was deposited at once, and the remainder paid by quarterly instalments, no insurance being asked for or proffered regarding risk. The arrangement entered into by the smack-owners for the conveyance of fish to shore, when they were engaged out at sea in their calling was most simple and business-like. The boats kept company during fishing, and on a certain signal being given one of the number, according to a previous agreement, received the whole of the fish so far caught by her fellow craft and returned home, for which service her men were paid 2s. each by the other crews, who continued their occupation and arrived in harbour generally on Friday. For the next week another smack was selected, and thus all in turn performed the mid-week journey. At present there are no less than eighty-four sloops belonging to this port, pursuing the business of fishing, and the arrangements both for their purchase and the landing of the captured fish have undergone a revolution. All boats are now paid for when they leave the shipbuilder’s yard, and the former custom of a mid-week relief, has been relinquished, each sloop returning and discharging as occasion requires. A fishing boat’s crew usually consists of four men and a boy. In conclusion it should be noticed that a special warehouse, about 90 feet long, was erected in 1859, solely for the use of the fishermen and agents, or dealers, connected with the trade.

CHAPTER IX.
THORNTON, CARLETON, MARTON, AND HARDON-WITH-NEWTON.

Torentum, or Thornton, was estimated in the time of William the Conqueror to contain six carucates of land fit for the plough, but this computation was exclusive of Rossall and Burn, which were valued at two carucates respectively, so that the whole townships held ten carucates, about one thousand acres of arable soil, or farming land, a large amount for those days, but insignificant indeed when we recall the nine thousand seven hundred and thirty acres embraced by the township at present, either in use for grazing and agricultural purposes, or forming the sites of town and village buildings.

Thornton was held immediately after the Conquest by Roger de Poictou, and subsequently by Theobald Walter, after whose death it passed to the crown.

During the reign of King John, Margaret Wynewick held two of the six carucates of Torentum, or Thornton, in chief from that monarch, and her marriage was in his gift. In 1214-15 Baldewinus Blundus paid twenty marks to John for permission to espouse the lady and gain possession of her estate.[87] The request was granted conditionally on Blundus obtaining the consent of her friends; and in this he appears to have been successful, for we learn from a writ to the warden of the Honor of Lancaster in 1221, that Michael de Carleton paid a fine of ten marks to Henry III. at that date for having married Margaret, the daughter and heiress of William de Winewick, without the royal assent, and for marrying whom Baldewinus Blundus had formerly paid twenty marks to King John.[88]

In 1258, Margaret de Carleton still retained her lands in Thornton in her maiden name of Winewick,[89] and it is probable from that circumstance that her second husband was then dead, for the writ cited above expressly commanded that her inheritance should be handed over to Michael de Carleton, the penalty of ten marks for his disobedience having been received.

According to the Testa de Nevil, Matilda de Thorneton, a spinster, whose marriage also lay in the king’s gift, held lands in Thornton, of the annual value of twenty shillings; and later, about 1323, a moiety of Thornton was held by Lawrence, the son of Robert de Thorneton, a member of the same family. In 1346, John, son of Lawrence de Thorneton, held one carucate of land in Thornton and Staynolfe, lately of Robert Windewike, in thanage, paying yearly at four terms thirteen shillings relief, and suit to the county and wapentake.[90] In 1421 John de Thornton died, possessed of half the manor of Thornton and the Holmes, which descended to his son, William de Thornton, who died in 1429, aged thirty years, leaving four daughters—Agnes, afterwards the wife of William Wodey; Katherine, who married William Carleton; Elizabeth, the wife of Robert Adlington; and Johanna, who espoused Christopher Worthington.[91] Much as it is to be regretted, no more than the scanty information here given can be discovered concerning the Thorntons, of Thornton; even tradition is silent on the matter of their residence or local associations, although it is very likely they occupied Thornton Hall, a mansion long since converted into a farm house, and consequently we are obliged to dismiss with this brief notice what under more favourable auspices would probably have proved one of the most interesting subjects in the township. In 1292 the king’s attorney sued Thomas de Singleton for the manor of Thornton, etc., but the defendant pleaded successfully, that he only held a portion of the manor, Thomas de Clifton and Katherine, his wife, holding the third of two parts of twelve bovates of the soil.[92] In the seventeenth year of the reign of Edward II., William, father of Adam Banastre, who granted certain concessions to the prior of Lancaster, held, half the vill of Thornton, the other half being held, as before shown, by Lawrence de Thorneton.

In an ancient survey of the Hundred of Amounderness, completed in the year 1346, it is stated that the following gentlemen had possessions in the place called Stena, or Stainall, in Thornton, at the rentals specified:—John de Staynolfe held four oxgangs of land, at four shillings and sixpence;[93] Roger de Northcrope, one messuage and one oxgang, at sevenpence halfpenny; Sir Adam Banastre, knt., five acres, at fourpence; Thomas, the son of Robert Staynolfe, one messuage and one oxgang, at sevenpence halfpenny; William Lawrence, a fourth part of an oxgang, at sixteen pence; Thomas Travers, a fourth part of an oxgang, at sixteen pence; John Botiler, a fourth part of an oxgang, at sixteen pence; and Richard Doggeson, five acres, at sixpence. William de Heton held one carucate of land at Burn, in Thornton township, for which he paid yearly at two terms, Annunciation and Michaelmas, ten shillings relief, and suit to the county and wapentake.[94]

In 1521, during the sovereignty of Henry VIII., Thomas, earl of Derby, was lord of the manor of Thornton, which subsequently passed into the hands of the Fleetwoods, of Rossall, who retained it until the lifetime of the late Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, bart., when it was sold. Thornton has for long been regarded only as a reputed manor. The largest land proprietors at present are the Fleetwood Estate Company, Limited, and the trustees of the late John Horrocks, esq., of Preston, but in addition there is a number of smaller soil-owners and resident yeomen. Burn Hall is a building of the fifteenth century, and was occupied in 1556 by John Westby, of Mowbreck, the owner.[95] In 1323 the land of Burn was held by William Banastre at a rental of ten shillings per annum, and about 1346 one carucate of the same land was held, as already stated, by William de Heton for a similar yearly payment. Within the residence of Burn was a domestic chapel, over the doorway of which stood a polished oaken slab or board inscribed—“Elegi abjectus esse in domo Dei mei, magis quam habitari in tabernaculis peccatorum.”[96] The walls were panelled with oak and carved with shields and foliage, whilst the ceiling was embellished with representations of vine leaves and clusters of grapes. Modern alterations have destroyed most, if not all, interesting relics of past ages. After the death of John Westby, of Burn Hall, a descendant of the John Westby before mentioned, in 1722, Burn passed to the Rev. J. Bennison, of London, who had married Anne, his fourth daughter. It is said that Mr. Bennison utterly ruined his property, by attempting a style of agriculture similar to that described by Virgil in his Georgics. Burn Hall is now, and has been for many years a farm-house, and the estate forms part of the large tract held by the representatives of the late John Horrocks, esq. The land lying towards the coast was formerly subject to occasional inundations of the sea, but an effectual barrier has been put by raising a mound round such exposed localities.

The extensive area known as Thornton Marsh, was a free open common, used as a pasture by the poor cottagers of the township until 1800, when it was enclosed, together with Carleton Marsh, and has since by cultivation been converted into valuable and productive fields.

A church and parsonage house were erected at Thornton in 1835, the former being a neat whitewashed building in the early English style of architecture, with a low square tower, but presenting externally no special features of attraction beyond its profuse covering of ivy, which renders it a most picturesque object in the surrounding landscape. The churchyard also is well worthy of notice, if only for the luxuriance of its foliage, the beauty of its flowers, and the taste and elegance exhibited in several of the monuments. This, like the church and parsonage, is embosomed in trees. The sacred edifice has been named Christ Church, and a separate parochial district was assigned to it in 1862, the title of vicar being accorded to the incumbent.

Within the building there is a small gallery at the west end, and the private pews are arranged in two rows, one being placed along each side of the body of the church, whilst the central portion is filled with open benches, or forms, free to all worshippers. A marble tablet “To the memory of Jacob Morris, a faithful warden for 20 years, who died Oct., 1871,” is fixed against the south wall, and over the mantel-piece in the vestry is a white-lettered black board stating that—“This Church was erected in the year 1835, containing 323 sittings; and, in consequence of a grant from the Incorporated Society for promoting the enlargement, building, and repairing of churches and chapels, 193 of that number are hereby declared to be free and unappropriated for ever.—David Hilcock Leighton, minister; James Smith and Richard Wright, churchwardens.” On the font is the following inscription:—“Presented to Thornton Church by Elizabeth Nutter, of Rough Hall, Accrington, July 13th, 1874.”

Mr. James Baines, of Poulton, by will dated 6th of January, 1717, devised to Peter Woodhouse, of Thornton, and six others, and their heirs, the school-house lately erected by him on Thornton Marsh, and the land whereon it stood, to be used for ever as a free school for the children of the township; in addition he bequeathed to the same trustees several closes in Carleton, called the Far Hall Field, the Middle Hall Field, and the Vicar’s Hey, amounting to about twenty-one acres, to the intent, that the annual revenue therefrom, less 10s. to be expended each year in a dinner for the trustees, should be devoted to the payment of a suitable master. In 1806, Richard Gaskell, the sole surviving trustee, conveyed by indenture to John Silcock, John Hull, Thomas Barton, of Thornton, Charles Woodhouse of Great Carleton, Bickerstaff Hull, and Thomas Hull, and the said Richard Gaskell, their heirs and assigns, the premises above-mentioned, for the purposes set forth in the will of the founder.[97] A further endowment of £500 was left by Mr. Simpson, with a portion of which farm buildings have been erected on the school estate. The school-house is situated on the east side of Cleveleys Station, and consists of a small single-storey building, having two windows and a central doorway in front. To the west end is attached a two-storey teacher’s residence. The double erection was built some years ago, by subscription amongst the inhabitants, on the site of the original fabric at a cost of rather more than £100. The master is elected and, when necessary, dismissed by the trustees, who forego their claim on the 10s. left for an annual dinner. In 1867 the number of scholars amounted to eighty-eight, fifty-nine of whom were boys, and twenty-nine girls, presenting about an average attendance since that date.

The small village of Thornton comprises only a limited cluster of dwellings and the old windmill. The Wesleyan Methodists had established a place of worship in the township as early as 1812, and about ten years later the Society of Friends opened a meeting-house here.

The arable land of Rossall, in Thornton township, or Rushale, as it was written, is estimated in the Domesday volume at two carucates. At that time Rossall was included amongst the princely possessions of the Norman baron, Roger de Poictou, after whose banishment it passed, by gift of Richard I., to Theobold Walter, and again reverted to the crown in 1206, on his demise. King John, at the instigation of Ranulph de Blundeville, earl of Chester and Lincoln, presented the grange of Rossall to the Staffordshire convent of Deulacres, a monastic house founded by that nobleman; and in 1220-1 Henry III. issued a writ to the sheriff of this county, directing him to institute inquiries by discreet and lawful men, into the extent of several specified places, one of which was the pasture of Rossall, recently, “granted by my father, King John, to the abbot of Deulacres.”[98] In 1227-8 a deed was drawn up between Henry III. and the abbot whereby the grange was conveyed, or confirmed, to the latter[99]; and twenty years subsequently a fresh charter appears to have been framed and to have received the royal signature, for in the following reign of Edward I., when that monarch laid claim to the land as a descendant of King John, the head of the Staffordshire convent produced a document of 31 Henry III. (1247), at the trial, granting “to God, the church of St. Mary, and the abbot of Deulacres and his successors for ever, the manor of Rossall with its appurtenances and with the wreck of the sea.”[100] Sir Robert de Lathum, Sir Robert de Holaund, Sir John de Burun, Sir Roger de Burton, Sir John de Cornwall, Sir John de Elyas, and Sir Alan de Penyngton, knights; Alan de Storeys, Robert de Eccleston, William du Lee, Hugh de Clyderhou, and Roger de Middleton, esquires, who composed the jury in the above suit, decided in favour of the abbot’s title, but at the request of the king’s attorney, judgment was arrested, and it was pleaded on behalf of the regal claimant that the abbot’s allegations seemed to imply that the manor of Rossall was formerly held by the monks of Deulacres in bailiwick of Kings, John and Henry; that thirty years at least of the reign of Henry had elapsed before the predecessors of the present abbot held any fee or free tenement in the manor, which was worth 100 marks per annum; and that this rent had been in arrears during the whole of the time; wherefore the king’s attorney demanded that the accumulation of these arrears, amounting to 3,000 marks, or £2,000, should be paid by the abbey to Edward I. The jury stated in their verdict that the manor had been held by the abbot’s predecessors as pleaded by the king’s attorney, but that during the last seven years of King John, and the first twenty-four years of Henry III., the manor was only worth 30 marks per annum, and in the remaining six years before the date of the charter put in as evidence by the abbot in the first trial, they valued the manor at 40 marks per annum, on which scales the abbey of Deulacres was condemned to pay the accumulated arrearages. In 1539, during the reign of Henry VIII., the grange was valued in the Compotus of the king’s ministers at £13 6s. 3d. per annum.

The site of the original Hall has long since been washed away by the waves, but in earlier years, before the sea had made such encroachments on the land, the foundations of red sandstone and the remnant of an old ivied wall were visible near the edge of the cliff, all being sufficiently traceable to indicate that the mansion had been one of no mean dimensions. A coat of arms of the Fleetwood family, rudely engraven on a flat stone, some ornamental pinnacles, and other relics of the ancient edifice, have also been discovered at different times. Numerous foundations of large buildings were once scattered about the sandy soil of the grange, but most of them were removed eighty years since as impediments to the course of the plough. In a plot of ground, known by the title of “Churchyard field,” remains of a structure, running east and west, in length thirty and in breadth twelve yards, were taken up about half a century or more ago by a farmer named John Ball, who whilst removing them came upon some human bones. The fabric once standing there was conjectured to have been a chapel or oratory, and the bones to have been those of priests or others buried within its precincts. Harrison, in describing the course of the Wyre, says “that at the Chapell of Allhallowes tenne myles from Garstone it goeth into the sea,” and Mr. Thornber suggests, in his History of Blackpool and Neighbourhood, that the foundations disturbed by Mr. Ball may have been the remains of the oratory alluded to by the ancient topographer; but whilst admitting that the character of the relics discovered points to there having been at one time a religious edifice on the site, we cannot think that its claims to be the missing chapel are nearly so great as those of Bispham, which is now known, by an inscription on an old communion goblet, to have been actually dedicated to All-Hallows, or at least to have been commonly designated by that name in the seventeenth century.

The Allens appear to have held Rossall on lease from the abbot of Deulacres about a century after the dispute between that monastery and Edward I. had been decided, for in 1397, during the reign of Richard II., the name of “Allen of Ross-hall” was entered in the list of donors to the fraternities of the Preston Guild of that year. George Allen, of Brookhouse, Staffordshire, who held Rossall at the date of the Reformation, by virtue of a long lease granted to his ancestors by an abbot of Deulacres, is the earliest of this family to whom these tenants of the grange can be traced genealogically. The widow and daughters of the grandson of George Allen were ejected from Rossall in 1583, before the expiration of their lease, and despoiled of valuable documents and property by Edmund Fleetwood, whose father had purchased the reversion from Henry VIII., at the time of the dissolution of monasteries. On that occasion a neighbour, Anion, seized and appropriated £500 belonging to the Allens on pretence of remitting it to Dr. William Allen, at Rheims. Mrs. Allen made an attempt to recover possession of the grange, and a trial for that purpose took place at Manchester, but her case broke down through inability to produce the original deeds and papers, all of which had been either stolen or destroyed when the Hall was plundered during the ejection.[101] The estate, or grange, of Rossall, remained in the hands of the Fleetwoods until the death of Edward Fleetwood, when it passed to Roger Hesketh, of North Meols, who married Margaret, the only child and heiress of that gentleman in 1733.[102] The Heskeths, of Rossall, were descended from the Heskeths of Rufford, through Hugh Hesketh, an offspring of Sir Thomas Hesketh, of Rufford. Hugh Hesketh married the eldest daughter and co-heiress of Barneby Kytichene, or Kitchen, and thus acquired a moiety of the manor of North Meols. At the decease of Hugh Hesketh, in 1625, the lands of North Meols descended to his son, Thomas Hesketh, then 56 years of age, whose son and heir, Robert Hesketh, was already married to the daughter of—Formby, of Formby. The only child of Robert Hesketh was the Roger Hesketh, mentioned above, who also held Tulketh Hall and estate. The Heskeths continued to reside at Rossall until the lifetime of the late Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood, bart.; and under their proprietorship, at an early period, or in the latest years of their predecessors, the ancient Hall was pulled or washed down and another mansion erected more removed from the shore.

In 1843 the design of establishing a school for the education of the sons of clergymen and other gentlemen, under the direct superintendence of the Church of England, but at a less cost than incurred at the public schools then in existence, was first promulgated by the Rev. St. Vincent Beechey, incumbent of Thornton and Fleetwood; and mainly through the exertions of that gentleman a provisional committee for arranging details and furthering the object in view, was formed in the first month of the ensuing year. This committee consisted, amongst others, of the Rev. J. Owen Parr, vicar of Preston, chairman; the Revs. Charles Hesketh, vicar of North Meols; William Hornby, vicar of St. Michael’s-on-Wyre; John Hull, vicar of Poulton; R. B. Robinson, incumbent of Lytham; St. Vincent Beechey, incumbent of Thornton and Fleetwood, hon. sec. pro. tem.; and Messrs. Thomas Clifton, of Lytham Hall; Daniel Elletson, of Parrox Hall, and T. R. Wilson-ffrance, of Rawcliffe Hall. At their first meeting it was decided that the management of the school should be placed in the hands of a committee of twenty-four of the principal clergy and laity in the neighbourhood, of whom fourteen should be clergymen and ten laymen, with power to fill up vacancies; that the bishop of the diocese should always be the visitor; that the provisional committee should be the first members of the council, with which should rest the appointment of the principal, who must be in holy orders, at such a liberal salary as would insure the services of one eminently qualified for so important a post; that the council should have power to dismiss the principal; that the internal management, subject to certain regulations, should be committed to the principal, who should have the appointment and dismissal of all the inferior or subordinate masters; and that the system of education should resemble that in the school connected with King’s College, London, and in Marlborough school, consisting of systematic religious instruction, sacred literature, classics, mathematics, modern languages, drawing, music, etc.

With regard to the admission of pupils it was resolved that the school should consist of not less than two hundred boys; that no child should be admitted under eight years of age; that the mode of admission should be by annual payment, nomination, or insurance; that any pupil should be admitted on the payment, half-yearly in advance, of £50 per annum for the sons of laymen, and £40 for the sons of clergymen; that nominations might be procured, at the first opening of the school, in order to raise the required capital, whereby pupils could be admitted on the yearly payment of £40 for the sons of laymen, and £30 for the sons and wards of clergymen; that a donation of £25, or the holding of two £25 shares, fully paid up, should entitle the donor or holder, to one nomination, and a donation of £50, or the holding of four shares of £25 each, should constitute the donor, or holder, a life-governor, entitled to have always one pupil in the school on his nomination; that the shares should be limited to an annual interest of 5 per cent., and be paid off as soon as possible, the return of such capital, however, not to destroy the right of nomination during the life of a governor; that clergymen should be able to provide for the admission of their children to the school at a reduced charge of £25 per annum, by paying, on the principle of life-insurance, small sums for several years previous to, or one large sum at, the date of entry of each child into the establishment, such payments to be regulated according to certain tables, and, of course, forfeited in case the child died.

The committee stated that the outlay of capital required to erect a building expressly for the purposes of the school would be greater than they were likely to be able to meet at the low rate of nomination which it had been deemed expedient to adopt, and, therefore, it had been determined to take advantage of the offer of Rossall Hall by Sir P. H. Fleetwood, bart., the mansion being eminently adapted to the purpose, on account of its size and situation. It contained many suites of rooms, and an organ chamber, well suited for a chapel, and furnished with a fine instrument; and surrounding the Hall were meadows convenient for play-grounds, and very productive gardens.

The title of the Northern Church of England School was given to the institution, and on Thursday, the 22nd of August, 1844, it was formally opened by the Head Master, Dr. Woolley, in the presence of the junior masters and from forty to fifty pupils, with their parents. At that date the school-buildings consisted of apartments in the old Hall for the principal, junior masters, and lady superintendent; a dining room, 44 feet long and 20 feet wide, fitted with a general and masters’ tables; four dormitories, able to accommodate 100 boys; and a chapel, formerly the organ-room above mentioned, having benches for the scholars and stalls for the masters, the school-house itself consisting of four lofty rooms, each about 34 feet long by 20 feet wide, being detached from the Hall, and fitted up with handsome oak desks and benches, fixed upon bronzed cast-iron standards. The play-ground comprised many acres, and in addition there were convenient covered areas for the recreation of the boys in wet weather.

The school was opened with only 70 pupils, but at the beginning of the second six months the number had increased to 115, and the establishment was self-supporting.

The rules of the school have undergone some slight modifications and additions since they were first framed by the provisional committee, and no pupils are now admitted under ten or over fifteen years of age, whilst the annual payments of all pupils have been raised £20 in each case. The insurance plan of entrance was never adopted. A donation of 50 guineas now entitles the donor to a single nomination, and one of 100 guineas constitutes him a life-governor, with power to vote at all general meetings, and to have always one pupil in the school on his nomination. Other rules for the internal management and government of the school have been framed as the number of scholars has increased and their requirements become greater.

There are three exhibitions connected with this institution, of £50 a year each, called respectively the Council, Beechey, and Osborne exhibitions, (the last two being named after the late Honorary Secretary and the late Head Master, through whose exertions the funds were mainly contributed,) tenable for three years at any of the colleges of Oxford or Cambridge; and one of £10 a year, in books, tenable for three years, and founded by Lord Egerton, of Tatton. Besides these there are about eight or ten entrance scholarships offered for competition every year, ranging in value from £10 to £20 each. Of these seven were founded by George Swainson, esq., and one by the Bishop of Rupertsland. A number of other special prizes have been instituted by the present Head Master, the Rev. H. A. James, B.D.

In 1850 the estate was purchased, and since then fresh buildings have been erected to provide accommodation for 400 boys. The old chapel, which was built to supersede the one in the organ-room, has of late years been converted into a library and class-room. A dining hall, schools, class-rooms for different branches of study, spacious dormitories, and a swimming bath have all been added; whilst extensive enlargements and improvements have taken place in the sanatorium, kitchens, laundries, etc. The old school has been arranged and fitted up as a lecture-room and laboratory. The new chapel is a handsome edifice, containing stained glass windows and a richly decorated chancel; it is dedicated to the Holy Trinity. It should be added that the original name,—The Northern Church of England School,—has been discontinued, and that of Rossall School, substituted, as a more comprehensive title for a great public school.

A preparatory school in connection with this college was successfully established during the reign of Mr. Osborne, about one mile distant along the shore, in a southerly direction, to which pupils are admitted at seven years of age, but not younger, and subsequently drafted into the higher institution.

POPULATION OF THORNTON TOWNSHIP, EXCLUSIVE OF FLEETWOOD.

Carleton, anciently written Carlentun, is named in the Domesday Book as comprising four carucates of land; and in the Black Book of the Exchequer, it is stated that during the reign of Henry II., 1154-89, Gilbert Fitz Reinfred held four carucates in Carlinton and another place. In 1254 the manor of Carleton in Lancashire belonged to Emma de St. John, and at that date there appears to have been some litigation concerning her right of proprietorship, but how settled we have no means of discovering.[103] In the Testa de Nevill it is recorded that Roger Gernet had the 24th part, and Robert de Stokeport the 48th, of a knights’ fee in Little Carleton of William de Lancaster’s fee.

The earliest allusion to the local territorial family occurs in 1221, when Michael de Carleton, as before stated under “Thornton,” paid a fine to Henry III. for having espoused Margaret Wynewick, or Winwick, a royal ward, without first obtaining permission from the king. It has been conjectured that Much Carleton received its peculiar title from this member of the family, and amongst the records of some ancient pleadings is one of 1557 concerning certain lands in Miche Carlton, a mode of writing the name which lends considerable support to the theory. Alyce Hull, widow, was the plaintive in the dispute. The Carletons, of Carleton, were connected with the neighbourhood for a very long period as holders of the manor; Alicia, the daughter of William de Carleton married Sir Richard Butler, of Rawcliffe Hall, in 1281, and received the manor of Inskip as her dowry; and in 1346 H. de Carleton possessed four carucates and a half in Carleton.[104] Thomas de Carleton held the manor of Carleton up to the time of his death in 1500, when he was succeeded by his son and heir George Carleton, aged 22,[105] who died in 1516, leaving an only child, William, then eleven years of age.[106] William de Carleton came into possession of the property on attaining his legal majority,[107] and died in 1557, being succeeded by Lawrence Carleton, probably his brother. Lawrence Carleton, who had married Margaret, the daughter of George Singleton, of Staining, held the estate for barely twelve months, as he died in 1558 without issue, leaving his lands and tenements in Carleton, amounting to several extensive messuages and Carleton Hall, to his only surviving sister, Margaret, the wife of Thomas Almond.[108] Thus Lawrence Carleton was the last of the manorial family of that name connected with the township. Of the ancient Hall of Carlton, the seat of the Carletons for over three centuries, nothing can be learnt beyond the fact that it stood opposite the Gezzerts farm, and that almost, if not quite, within the recollection of the present generation some ruins of the once noble mansion were visible on its former site, long since enclosed and used for purposes of agriculture. In 1261 the abbey of Cockersand held some property in Carleton, as appears from an agreement entered into at that date between the abbot of Cockersand and H. de Singleton Parva, by which the latter transferred a messuage in Carleton, by the side of other messuages already belonging to the abbey, to the abbot, in exchange for messuages and an acre of ground in the vicinity of Stanlawe abbey in Cheshire.[109] Stanlawe abbey itself had sundry possessions in Carleton shortly after its foundation in 1175,[110] all of which were conveyed to the abbey of Whalley in 1296, when the two monastic houses were united, and thus it happened that this township was included amongst the localities in which Whalley abbey held lands at the time of its dissolution.

Sometime during the reign of Henry VIII. the Sherburnes, of Stonyhurst, Hambledon, etc., became holders of soil in Carleton, and at a later period had acquired the manorial rights and privileges. In 1717 Sir Nicholas Sherburne, bart., bequeathed the manor of Carleton, amongst numerous other estates, to his only child and heiress, Maria Winifreda Francisca, the duchess of Norfolk, and two years later the duke of Norfolk had obtained a settlement by which he held a life interest in Carleton, Stonyhurst, and other places, the duchess, however, having reserved to herself the power to dispose of the reversion or inheritance by will or deed, executed in the duke’s lifetime. The duchess of Norfolk bequeathed her real estate, including Carleton, on her death in 1745, to her cousin Edward Weld, esq., grandson of Sir John Weld, of Lulworth Castle, Dorsetshire, whose descendant Edward Joseph Weld, esq., has disposed of most of his inheritance in the township to various purchasers, chiefly amongst the local yeomanry and gentry.

The Bambers, of the Moor, in Carleton, were people of position in the township. Richard Bamber, during the latter half of the sixteenth century, married Anne, the daughter of Thomas Singleton, of Staining Hall, and consequently was the brother-in-law of John Leckonby, of Leckonby House, Great Eccleston, who had espoused Alice, another daughter of the same gentleman. It is impossible to affirm with certainty what children sprang from the union of Richard Bamber and Ann Singleton, but of one of them, Edward, who entered the Romish priesthood, we subjoin an interesting and tragic account, extracted from the “Memoirs of Missionary Priests, by the Right Rev. Richard Challoner, D.D.”:—

“Edward Bamber, commonly known upon the commission by the name of Reding, was the son of Mr. Richard Bamber, and born at a place called the Moor, the ancient mansion-house of the family, lying not far from Poulton, in that part of Lancashire called the Fylde. Having made good progress with his grammar studies at home, he was sent abroad into Spain, to the English college at Valladolid, where he learnt his philosophy and divinity, and was ordained priest. My short memoirs leave us much in the dark as to many passages and particulars relating to the life and labours of this good priest, as well as to the history of his trial; but then short as they are they are very expressive of his zeal and indefatigable labours, his unwearied diligence in instructing the catholics under his charge, disputing with protestants, and going about doing good everywhere, with a courage and firmness of mind almost above the power and strength of man. When, how, or where, he was apprehended, I have not found, but only this, that he had lain three whole years a close prisoner at Lancaster castle, before he was brought to the bar, where he stood with an air of fortitude and resolution of suffering in defence of truth. Two fallen catholics, Malden and Osbaldeston, made oath that they had seen him administer baptism and perform the ceremonies of marriage; and upon these slender proofs of his priesthood, the jury, by the judge’s direction, found him guilty of the indictment. Whereupon the judge sentenced him to be hanged, cut down alive, drawn, quartered, etc., as in cases of high treason. It was on the 7th of August, 1646, that he, with two fellow priests, and a poor wretch, named Croft, condemned to death for felony, were drawn upon sledges to the place of execution at Lancaster. There Mr. Bamber exhorted Croft to repentance, and besought him to declare himself a Catholic, confess some of his more public sins, and be truly contrite and sorry for all—‘and I, a priest and minister of Jesus Christ, will instantly in his name, and by his authority, absolve thee.’ On hearing this the officers of Justice began to storm but Mr. Bamber held his ground, and finally absolved the man in sight and hearing of the crowd. As Mr. Bamber mounted up the ladder, he paused after ascending a few steps, and taking a handful of money from his pocket, threw it amongst the people, saying, with a smiling countenance, that ‘God loveth a cheerful giver.’ Mr. Bamber was encouraging Mr. Whitaker, one of the other two priests about to suffer, who appeared not a little terrified at the approach of death, to be on his guard against the temptation to save his life by renouncing his creed, when the sheriff called out hastily to the executioner to dispatch him (Bamber); and so he was that moment turned off the ladder, and permitted to hang but a very short time, before the rope was cut, the confessor being still alive; and thus he was butchered in a most cruel and savage manner.”

The two following verses, relating to his death, form part of a long ode or sonnet written at the time:—

“Few words he spoke—they stopp’d his mouth,

And chok’d him with a cord;

And lest he should be dead too soon,

No mercy they afford.