THE EPPING HUNT. 



35 



opinion given stated that it was quite within the competence of the 

 Corporation to aboh'sh the office, and, indeed, to resign any or all 

 their franchises ; but the inexpediency of such a course was strongly 

 urged, mainly, it seems, on the ground that it would destroy an 

 evidence of the dignity and pre-eminence " of the City of London 

 in times of the remotest antiquity," and a parallel was instituted 

 between the office of Grand Falconer and that under consideration. 

 The Corporation, notwithstanding all this, did finally on July 21st, 

 1807, pass a resolution abolishing the office of Com.mon Hunt, but 

 the extracts before us afford no information as to what solace was 

 ^iven to the then holder of the office. 



Though the Huntsman ceased to exist, the hunting continued. 

 For, in the Minutes of Evidence taken before the Select Committee,'-' 

 uid ordered to be printed in 1863, Lieut.-Colonel George Palmer, 

 he then surviving Verderer, said that the Lord Mayor and Aldermen 

 lad, to his knowledge, exercised for fifty years the right of hunting and 

 cilling a stag once a year ; and Mr. Alderman Copeland elsewhere 

 Question 1,131) spoke of having attended the Easter hunts from 

 1808 downwards. 



With this last entry the Memorandum ends. Perhaps the brief 

 iccount of its contents already given may incite someone interested 

 n the subject of the Epping Hunt to pursue the subject, and to see 

 low much further back it can be traced. For it clearly was already an 

 istablished custom in 1808 ; and, if so, mention of it must surely occur 

 n old newspapers or elsewhere. So early as February 12th, 1705, 

 fohn Wroth, then lord of the manor of Loughton, and a Justice of 

 he Peace, is reported ^" to have committed the Lord Mayor's Foot- 

 luntsman to the custody of a constable for hunting the City's hounds 

 n the Forest. Mr. Common Hunt was thereupon ordered to repair 

 Mr. Wroth and tender bail. Mr. Wroth, who expressed a desire 

 'to try the City's right of hunting," bound the huntsman and others 

 )ver to answer at the next Quarter Sessions for unlawfully hunting 

 n the Forest. It was then thought advisable to bring an action 

 gainst the constable for assault and imprisonment, but it does not 

 .ppear that anything further was done in the matter. The records 

 )f Quarter Sessions, if still in existence, might throw some addi- 

 ional hght on it. William Chapman Waller. 



9 Royal Forests of Essex : 798, p 25. 



10 " Repertory Rawlinson " No. 1 10, fj. 73B (City Records, as quoted in the Metiioranduiii). 



