THE MANUSCRIPTS BELONGING TO THE CORPORATION OF THE BOROUGH OF KING'S LYNN CO. NORFOLK.
Few of our provincial boroughs possess muniments of greater value
to the constitutional historian than the manuscripts to which public
attention is here invited. Perhaps no borough of moderate population
and importance has been so fortunate as Lynn Regis in the number and
quality of the literary illustrators of its records. Years have passed
over the graves of Mr. Hudson Gurney, who in 1832 called the attention
of the Royal Society of Antiquaries to certain "Proceedings of the
Corporation of Lynn Regis from 1430 to 1731;" of Mr. Daniel
Gurney, who made the archives of the borough a subject of long and
careful study; of the Reverend G. H. Dashwood, F.S.A., who concontributed to the first volume of "Norfolk Archæology" the well
known "Remarks on Subsidy Roll (temp. Edward I.) in the possession
of the Corporation of Lynn Regis;" of Mr. Alan Swatman, a native
of Lynn, whose researches in the rolls of the borough enabled him to
discredit and disperse long-enduring misconceptions respecting the
nature and conditions of Queen Isabella's residence at Rising Castle;
of Mr. Charles Wycliffe Goodwin, another native of Lynn, who in the
pages of "Norfolk Archæology" vindicated the genuineness of Cnut's
charter to the monks of St. Edmundsbury, whilst imparting new interest
to the so-called Hardecnut's charter of confirmation, which he demonstrated by internal evidence to be nothing more than an ingenious
forgery; and Mr. Harrod, whose published " Report on the Deeds and
Records of the Borough of King's Lynn" (1874), enlarged the world's
knowledge of a singularly instructive body of municipal evidences.
These eminent antiquaries have passed from us. But in Mr. E. M.
Beloe, the learned coroner of his native town and the luminous author
of "Our Borough" and "Our Lady's Hill," who was the first writer
on the antiquities of the borough to display the peculiar constitution
and special functions of the council of "the Twenty-Seven," Lynn is
still fortunate in having a man of letters signally qualified to produce
what still remains to be written, an adequate history of King's Lynn.
Lying in a county, whose antiquaries have for several generations
figured in the van of archæological enquirers, it is needless to say that
the Lynn archives were found by the present reporter in good preservation and order. The dark and narrow chamber in which they are
kept is, no doubt, scarcely worthy of its treasures; but the late Mr. Harrod
some years since catalogued and arranged the various records so effectively, that any competent searcher can without difficulty put his hand on
any writing of the collection which he may wish to peruse. For the
purposes of this report, the historic manuscripts so well kept and cared
for may be divided into four groups,
(a.) Books,
(b.) Charters, Letters Patent and Privy Scal Writs,
(c.) Rolls, from the time of Edward I. to 1656 A.D., and
(d.) Miscellaneous Writings, viz. Deeds of Gift, Acknowledgments,
Agreements, Memoranda &c.
Whilst the Chamberlains' Rolls and Gild Rolls afford a large number
of noteworthy particulars, touching the social manners, commercial affairs
and political interests and vicissitudes of the burghers of Bishop's Lenne
in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the charters, letters-patent and
miscellaneous writings are especially instructive in what they tell us of
the burghers' relations with their "lord" the Bishop of Norwich, and
of the town's internal dissensions, rivalries and conflicts, when its
people of the laity were divided into three mutually suspicious and
antagonistic classes—the Potentiores, Mediocres and Inferiores—who
throughout successive generations scowled at one another daily in their
narrow lanes or by their wide water's side, and nursed their animosities
in petty quarrels, that were not the less bitter for being under ordinary
circumstances bloodless. To some gleaners of facts for social history,
these muniments will perhaps be chiefly entertaining for their exhibitions of the fireside feuds and contentions of a medieval borough. But
to graver students, more especially to writers of Constitutional History,
the Lynn archives will appear in a higher degree valuable for their
abundance of information respecting the ways in which the parliamentary representatives of the borough were elected and rewarded from
the earlier half of the fourteenth to the later half of the seventeenth
century.
It is no news that in olden time the burgesses of parliament for
Bishop's Lynn were now and again chosen by a committee of twelve
persons, specially appointed at a Congregation or Hall Assembly for the
purpose of the election. The discovery that John Waterden and Thomas
Spicer were thus chosen to represent the borough at the national council
in the 11th year of Henry the Sixth, and that two years and seven
months later Thomas Burgh and John Warryn became burgesses of
parliament for the borough, was the occasion of the communication
made in 1832 to the London antiquaries by Mr. Hudson Gurney, who
gained his knowledge of these elections, and of the other municipal
matters noticed in his letter, not from the records of the corporation,
but from Mr. Lane's manuscript-book of notes and extracts from certain
of the Assembly or Congregation Books, described in this report. Mr.
Gurney's letter being published in the Transactions of the Royal Society
of Antiquaries, its numerous items of curious information passed to the
cognizance of our writers of Constitutional History, whose recognition
of the value of the data thus put at their service does not appear to
have moved them to seek further instruction in the Hall Books, from
which the successive compilers of Mr. Lane's volume took their memoranda. It has been left for Commissions on Historical Manuscripts
to ascertain the extent of the period during which the Burgesses of
Parliament for Lynn appear from the borough records to have been
usually, if not invariably, chosen by a committee of twelve, and the
extent of the far longer period, during which the ordinary freemen of
the borough had no direct voice in the election of their members of
parliament, and indeed had no influence whatever on the parliamentary
representation, apart from their influence in the yearly elections of the
town-councillors who had a voice in the elections of the burgesses of
parliament.
The earliest of the extant records touching these elections-by-committee is the Certificate [vide the ensuing catalogue (d) Miscellaneous
Writings], from which it appears that, at an Assembly held in the
Guildhall of Bishop's Linn, in the 7th year of Edward the Second, for
making provision in respect to the business of the community in the
King's parliament and elsewhere, authority was given to a committee of
twenty-six persons to elect twelve of the more sufficient persons of the
borough, to be a committee for taking order and action in the matter;
that the committee so appointed by a larger committee had warranty
under the common seal that their arrangements for the town's business
should be adhered to by the community; and further that the whole
community concurred in this assembly-order. Though the certificate
makes no express mention of an election of burgesses of parliament, it
may be assumed confidently that in making the order the municipal
congregation had such an election in view. It may also be observed
that, though the order (according to the certificate) was for the appointment of a committee of twelve for the conduct and execution of municipal business, the committee of twenty-six appointed a committee of
thirteen individuals. Possibly this apparent discrepancy between the
instructions and action of the larger committee was due to a clerical
slip in the certificate. On the other hand, it may be that the committee
of twenty-six deliberately exceeded their instructions, and elected a
thirteenth man for the sake of his casting vote, in case the committee
proper should be evenly divided on any question of the affairs. The
record of the whole community's concurrence in and assent to this
arrangement is a noteworthy feature of the certificate, as it affords at
least presumptive evidence that in the earlier time of Edward the Second
the members of the Municipal Assembly did not presume to act definitively in so important a matter without the consent of the rest of the
community. It is the more worthy of consideration, because in the
near future it became the practice of the Assembly to appoint from
themselves a committee for choosing burgesses of parliament, without
consulting the general body of the burgesses, who in the records of a
later period, viz., the seventeenth-century Hall Books, are slightingly
designated "the burgesses at large." The fragmentary records afford
no precise information as to the commencement of the long term of generations, during which "the burgesses at large" had no personal part in
the selection of their burgesses of parliament, and seem to have been
wholly excluded from the parliamentary franchise by custom, that
probably originated in the readiness of the inferior burghers to assent to
whatever the chiefs of the community did in respect to the affairs of the
king's parliament. On the 9th of October in the 48th year of Edward
the Third (vide The Red Register), a committee of twelve members of
Assembly—viz., John Wyth, Hugh de Ellyngham, Geoffrey Sharyngton,
Edmund Berston, Richard Honton, John Penteney, Geoffrey Fransham,
Walter Dunton, John Grantham, John Stalworth, John Loke, and Nicholas
Bukworth—was appointed and sworn to elect two prudent and discreet
men for the King's parliament, to be held at Westminster on the morrow
of St. Edmund the King and Martyr; the result being that Robert
Bathe and John Waryn were chosen and sent to represent Bishop's
Lenn at the national council. The earliest memorandum of a parliamentary election in the Red Register, this entry in the Corporation's
oldest book of municipal acts and proceedings is also the earliest of the
borough's records of an election of two persons, with names duly given,
to represent the borough at the sovereign's parliament. But henceforth
such entries are frequent in the Red Register and the subsequent
Assembly Books. To say that, from the closing years of Edward the
Third's time to the opening of Henry the Eighth's regnal term, the
Members of Parliament for Bishop's Lenn were invariably chosen by a
committee of twelve would be to say something more than is certified
by the fragmentary records. But the entries of the Red Register, the
series of Assembly or Congregation Books, and the imperfect series of
Assembly or Congregation Rolls, interlying the final date of the Red
Register and the commencement of the earliest of the extant Assembly
Books, justify a statement that from the time of Edward III. to the
time of Henry VIII. the parliamentary representatives of Bishop's
Lenn were usually chosen by a committee of twelve members of the
municipal Assembly. Of the various ways in which the committee was
chosen, and of the Mayor's part in choosing the committee and conse
quent influence on the result, adequate information is afforded by the
extracts from successive Assembly Books, printed in ensuing pages of
this report.
The practice of electing members of parliament by a committee of
the Assembly was continued to and into Henry the Eighth's reign. On
7th January of that king's first year, a committee of twelve chose
Thomas Guyborn and Francis Mondeford for burgesses of parliament.
Two years later (28 January, 3 Henry VIII.) Thomas With, then
mayor of the community, and Francis Mondeford were elected in the
same manner to represent the borough in parliament. But on 31 March,
14 Henry VIII., instead of being elected by a committee, Thomas
Miller and Richard Bewshere were chosen for burgesses of parliament.
by the Burgesses of Congregation, viz. those of the burgesses who had
voice amongst the rulers of the borough, either as members of "the
twenty-four" or as members of "the twenty-seven." The record of this
election runs thus in the Assembly (or Congregation) Book No. IV.
"31 March, 14 Henry VIII. Congregation of the Burgesses held in
the Gild Hall of Bishop's Lenn:—Thomas Miller (gubernator), Richard
Bewshere, Thomas Leyghton, William Castell, Christopher Brodbank,
Richard Peper, John Holyour (sic), Roger Bowesey, Robert (sic)
Parmenter, Edward Baker, Thomas Palmer, William Crampe, William
Olyett, John Dunston, William Gerves, John Judde, Humfrey Wolle,
John Odam, William Wygan, William Kenette, Robert Roughton,
William Hall draper, Henry Duplak, William Locklay, William Hall
taylor, Peter Mowthe, John Malby junr., Robert Candeler, William
Baxter, William Mowthe, Simon Thompson,—The greater part of
whom, viz., Richard Peper, John Holys (sic), Peter (sic) Parmenter,
William Olyett, William Gerves, John Judde, Humfrey Wolle, John
Odam, William Wygan, William Kenette, Peter Mowthe, John Malby
junr., Robert Candeler, William Baxter, Thomas Water, William
Mowthe, Simon Thompson, Thomas Herryson, John Whyte, Robert
Lambard, John Suff, John Knappe elected these two under-written for
burgesses of Parliament.—Mr. Thomas Miller, gubernator, and Mr.
Richard Bewshere"—two of the persons who voted with the majority
being omitted from the preceding list of members present at the assembly.
Henceforth the parliamentary elections were made by the burgesses
in Assembly, voting or otherwise agreeing together personally, instead
of authorizing a committee to act for them in the matter. On the
substitution of a court of aldermen for a court of jurats, and a
common council of eighteen for a similar council of twenty-seven
members, the elections of burgesses of parliament were made by the
Mayor aldermen and common-councilmen, whose acts and proceedings
in Assembly are often designated the acts and proceedings of "the
House" or "this House," in the successive Hail Books. Chosen by
"the House," acting without reference to the views and wishes of the
inferior burgesses, i.e. the burgesses who were not members of assembly,
the burgesses of parliament received their authority and instructions
and wages from "the House," and on returning from the national
council rendered account to "the House" of their doings at, and of the
measures ordained by, the parliament. The period of their revolutionary
troubles had been entered by our ancestors of the seventeenth century,
before the ordinary freemen, the burgesses at large, of King's Lynn, were
suffered to take a direct and personal part in the choice of their parliamentry representatives; and a noteworthy memorandum in the Assembly
(or Congregation) Book No. IX. indicates with sufficient clearness, that
the part taken by the burgesses-at-large in the election of members of
the Long Parliament was resented by the superior people of the town
as an offensive novelty and a dangerous intrusion on the ancient privileges of "the house." From this memorandum it appears that on
2 January 1642 an Order of the Commons in Parliament, dated 15 Oct.
1642, "was brought and produced in the howse" (i.e. the municipal
house) "by Mr. Percevall and Mr. Toll, aldermen, in hec verba sq.:—
It is this day Ordered by the Commons now assembled in Parliament,
That the Maior, Aldermen and Common Counsell of the Towne of
Kinges Lynne in the county of Norfolk, Shall pay and allowe out of the
Towne Stock as formerly, unto John Percevall and Thomas Toll their
Burgesses, For this present Parliament as lardge an allowance per diem
as they have heretofore allowed any of their Aldermen that hath bene
Burgesses in Parliament for that towne, Notwithstandinge the Freemen of that towne had their voyces in the choice of the said John Percivall
and Tho: Toll to be their Burgesses for this present Parliament. If
the Mayor of Lynne can shew any cause to the countrary, we shalbe
ready to heare him;" on the receipt of which mandate from the Commons, it was ordered by the municipal Assembly "that Mr. Maior, Mr.
Recorder, Mr. Doughty, Mr. May and Mr. Leake with all convenient
speede shall consider of and draw up a Fittinge Answeare to present to
the Honourable Howse of Commons upon the said order, and offer the
same to be allowed by the howse."
At subsequent elections, however, the burgesses-at-large had no
voice in the choice of members. The memorandum of the affair in
Assembly (or Congregation) Book No. IX. perhaps leaves it questionable whether the mere freemen of the borough had a voice in the
election in September 1649 of the Earl of Salisbury to be one of their
burgesses of parliament, though I am disposed to infer their participation in the election from the terms of the order,—"That a letter be
written to the Right Honble the Earle of Salisbury by the Mayor from
his house, to give him knowledge that this house hath graunted him the
freedom of this Burgh, and that the Cominalty of this Burgh hath
elected him a Burgess of the Parliament of England." Had the earl
been elected for a parliamentary burgess by the same exclusive body,
that conferred the municipal franchise upon him, his election for parliament would scarcely have been attributed to the action of the
"commonalty." Later elections are however expressly declared by
memoranda of the same Hall Book to have been made by "the house."
On 18 August 1656, Generall John Desbrow and Maior-General
Phillipp Skippon were "chosen in this House to serve as Burgesses
for this Burrough, in his Highnes next parliament at Westminster."
In the following month (26 September 1656) it was ordered by the
municipal House, "that Mr John Horsnell of London be sent unto by
this House as their Solicitor in this behalfe to attende upon the Committee of Priviledges at Westminster to make good this house's auncient
Custome of electing of Burgesses to set in Parliament, and that an
abbreviate of the Records be sent up to him in order to his prosecution
of the same, And that in order therunto Mr New-elect Mr Joshua
Greene Mr Benjamyn Holly aldermen the Towneclarke Mr Robinson
Mr Pope and Mr Clampe or any four or more of them and any other
of the house that please be a Committee And are desired to meete this
afternoone . . . . to draw up instructions and state the buisnes
of election clearly betweene this House and the Comons of this Burgh
and make their report to this house the next Hall Day." This memorandum is followed in the same register by other entries touching the
conflict between the municipal house and the mere freemen, as to the
right of the latter to vote at elections of members of parliament.
Generall John Desbrowe (otherwise spelt, Disbrowe) having decided
to sit in parliament for the county of Somerset, and declined the seat
for Lynn Regis, Sir John Thorowgood on 19 Dec. 1656 " was by this
house chosen to be one of the Burgesses to serve in this present Parliamt" for the borough. Two years later (3 Jan. 1658) Mr Thomas
Toll and Captain Griffith Lloyd were chosen to be burgesses of parliament for the borough by "the Mayor Aldermen and Common Councell."
Touching the demand of the ordinary and mere freemen to have a voice
in this election, the Assembly (or Congregation) Book No X. gives this
remarkable note,—" 3 January 1658. About Election of Burgesses to
sett in Parliament:—Whereas severall Burgesses of this Burrough of
the Commons at large have this day made their requestes to this house
that they might be admitted to joyn with this house in the election of
Burgesses to sett in the next Parliament to be houlden at Westminster
the 27th day of this instant January, It is thought fitt and ordered
that the resolves of the Comittee of Priviledges of the last Parliament
and the Parliamentes Orders thereupon concerning Elections be first
read unto them in the open hall which is done accordingly. This day
alsoe upon further debate of the aforesaid business of Election of
Burgesses to sett in the next Parliament for this Burrough, it being
adjudged by this house that the right of election of the said Burgesses
is at present in this house according to the aforesaid order. It is therefore ordered that this house doe proceed to an election accordingly, And
that in case the said Commons at large shall after such election persist in
theire desires to have the precept for election of Burgesses to be read
unto them, That the same be read unto them for theire satisfaction."
If the precept for the election was read to the burgesses-at-large for
their satisfaction in accordance with this order of the municipal council,
and afforded them any degree of momentary contentment with their
electoral position, it certainly failed to reconcile them for any considerable time to their exclusion from the parliamentary franchise. For
in April 1660 they renewed their demand to be regarded and dealt
with as parliamentary voters, and urged it so effectually that the Mayor,
Aldermen and Common Council decided to waive for once, and without
prejudice to them and their successors in the future, the right of keeping
elections of members of parliament to themselves. "Whereas," it is
recorded in Hall Book No. X., under date of 16 April 1660, "Mr.
Mayor hath this day caused a Common Hall to be warned in order to
the election of Burgesses to serve in the next Parliament to be houlden
at Westminster and severall of the members of the house being mett
together in this house divers of the free Burgesses of this Burgh came
and requested that they might be admitted to elect Burgesses for the
said Parliament as their right which being taken into consideration this
House doth think fitt for the present satisfaction of the people to suffer
the Commons to elect, and to wave the election in this house for this
present election."
The right of freemen to vote at the parliamentary elections does not
appear ever again to have been seriously opposed or openly questioned.
Having waived their especial and choicest privilege for once, the
dominant class of the burgesses deemed it prudent and politic to surrender it altogether. Admitted to the vote on sufferance and by the
special grace of their municipal betters for a single turn in 1660, the
burgesses at large ever afterwards voted at the elections from which
they had been so long excluded. In practice, if not in legal theory,
they were admitted to the parliamentary franchise without an act of
parliament for their parliamentary enfranchisement.
Though less new and striking than the data respecting the ways in
which the burgesses chose their members of parliament, the memoranda
of the Hall Books, touching the payment of the chosen representatives,
afford numerous matters of interest together with several particulars
not wholly wanting in novelty. It is well for writers on the payment of
members of parliament to know that candidates for a seat in the Commons sometimes urged their readiness to occupy it gratuitously, as a
reason why their ambition should be gratified. In James the First's
time, when he sought the place of Member for the Norfolk borough, Sir
Robert Hitcham, the Queen's Attorney-General, commended himself to
the enlightened electors of Lynn Regis by offering to serve them for
nothing,—an offer of financial advantage that would doubtless be rated
as corrupt practice, should the custom of paying members of parliament
for their services be revived in these days of severe electoral purity.
But though he took the place for nothing, the Corporation thought
right to give Sir Robert at least on one occasion a handsome gratuity
for his service. "Whereas," it is recorded under date of 23 July 1610,
"Sir Robert Hitcham knight, the Queenes Majesties Attorney Generall
is purposed to come to this Towne from the Assizes att Norwich to
take his jorny to Elie where he is Judge of that Cownty Palatyne, and
that the said Sir Robt. Hitcham is one of the Burgesses of this Burgh
this present Parliament, and promised to take no wages for the same
when he was elected, Therefore itt is agreed that the Town shall
bestowe upon hym (as a gratuity) Twenty Powndes, and that he shall
be intertayned by the Mayor and that the charge thereof and of his
horsemeat shall be borne by the Towne."