BOROUGH OF NORTHAMPTON 



great decay of clothing in the shire.'* The enrolments 

 of apprentices on the town records show the tailors 

 as the most popular industry in the i6th and early 

 17th centuries, and the clothing trades running the 

 leather trades close for the fust place in the town. 

 There is a marked revival in weaving in the second half 

 of the 1 8th century, and though the shoemaking 

 trade is by now weU ahead, the poll books of the 

 elections of 1768, 1784 and 1790 show a large number 

 of woolcombers and weavers. ' A century ago,' says 

 James, writing in 1857, ' the woolstaplers of North- 

 ampton were the local magnates, the weavers of serges, 

 tammies and shallons more numerous than the shoe- 

 makers of the present day.'*^ In 1768 the weavers 

 seem to have congregated about the Mayorhold and 

 St. Giles', and the woolcombers in Bridge Street and 

 the south quarter in general, where it may be pre- 

 sumed the fullers would also be found, from the 

 proximity of the Cow Meadow, where their tenters 

 stood in the l6th and 17th centuries.'* 



The apprenticeship statistics cannot be regarded as 

 exhaustive, but they give some indication of the pro- 

 portion in which the different industries were pursued 

 in Northampton in the 17th and 1 8th centuries, and 

 of the extent to which the town population was 

 recruited from the country.** Of the great advance 

 of the shoemaking industry in this period an account 

 has been given in the previous volume.** In 1619 the 

 complaint of the nuisances caused by tanners, glovers, 

 whittawyers and parchment makers washing their 

 hides in the river and the watercourses of the Cow 

 Meadow** suggests that the leather trade was active, 

 but the glovers were still, apparently, as important 

 as the shoemakers. By 1662, however, Fuller could 

 say ' This town stands on other men's legs,' *' and 

 in 1689 the shoemakers of Northampton, petitioning 

 against a bill for the free transport of unwrought 

 leather overseas, asserted, ' A very considerable part 

 of the trade of this town has consisted, time out of 

 mind, in the manufacture of boots and shoes, great 

 quantities of which have been sent abroad.' ** The 

 colonial and military demand for Northampton boots 

 and shoes is thus of old standing, and war, from 164.2 

 onwards, has been a marked stimulant to the industry. 

 In 1794. the town was producing from 10,000 to 12,000 

 pairs a week, as against 7,000 to 8,000 in time of peace,*' 

 and its achievements in the war of 1914-18 were in 

 accordance with previous traditions. During the 

 four years of the war Northampton supplied the 

 Allied forces with 23 million pairs, Northamptonshire 

 contributing another 24 million, as against 23 million 



from the rest of the country.'*' These included 

 infantry boots for the French, Serbian, Italian, 

 Roumanian and American forces, Russian Cossack 

 boots, Canadian knee boots, ski boots, rope-soled 

 boots for the Tank corps, submarine deck boots, 

 Flying corps boots, highland shoes, mosquito boots, 

 seamen's shoes, and liospiial slippers, as well as the 

 standard B.5. British infantry boot.**- When the 

 period of Army requisitioning ended, however, the 

 Northants Journal of Commerce observed that the army 

 boot was a far heavier product than Northampton 

 manufacturers and Northampton operatives cared 

 to handle, as they preferred a higher grade boot.*^ 



In the 17th and l8th centuries Northampton was 

 noted as a centre for the purchase of horses. Baskervill 

 refers to the horse fairs in 1673,** and Morton in 1712 

 says that Northampton is famed for the best horses 

 in England.** The Earl of Moray writes of a friend 

 in 1683 : ' He is busy getting horses : he is resolved 

 to have them good or not at all, and if he get them 

 not here (in London) he will go down to Northampton, 

 where the best are.' ** The horse fairs were still well 

 attended in 1815. They are now held in the cattle 

 market on the Saturday nearest to June 24. 



The mills of Northampton, tliough not mentioned 

 in Domesday Book, have a long history. Conches 

 melne or the mill of Conge" is mentioned before 

 1 135, and its tithe was granted to St. Andrew's Priory 

 by Grimbold.** In 1274 there were two mills of that 

 name ■} in 1539, if we may identify the Quengions 

 mills of the Court of Augmentations with the 

 Congenes mill of 1320,2 there were five, two being 

 used for grinding ' meselyn corn,' one a ' colyn ' 

 mill for grinding wheat, and the other two being 

 fulling mills.* Marvells mill is apparently identical 

 v/ith the Merewyns mill of 1253,* the Merthensmylne 

 of the Hundred Rolls* and the Mervyns mylne 

 of the Valor Ecclesiasticus.' It also was held by St. 

 Andrew's,' like St. Andrew's mill north-west of the 

 town and RushmiU* to the south-east. A postern in 

 the town wall and a causeway seven feet wide led to 

 it.* After the Dissolution it was acquired by the 

 town, and a windmill was erected alongside of the 

 water mills.*' The mills having been leased to a 

 succession of tenants,** were employed about 1740 for 

 a new venture in cotton-spinning, financed by Edward 

 Cave, the founder and editor of the Gentleman's 

 Magazine and one of the original patrons of the 

 Northampton infirmary. The carding and roller- 

 spinning machinery invented by Lewis Paul,*^ which 

 anticipated Cartwright's inventions, was set up in 



" Acts of the Privy Council 1577-8, 



PP- 2+-5- 



" Quarterly Rtvieu, Jan. 1857, p. 30. 



" Boro. Rcc. ii, 217-8 ; Speed's Map of 

 1610. 



•* Compare evidence of regitters of 

 St. Gilei, in R. M. Serjeantjon, Hist, 

 of Cb. of St. Giles, Nortbampt. p. 

 210-11. 



•» r.C.H. Nmbants. ii, 317 fF. 



" Boro. Rec. ii, 217. 



" Morton in 1712 (p. 23) and Lytoni 

 in 1724 fiii, 513), confinn Fuller's account 

 ef the importance of the hosiery trade, 

 which is not reflected in the apprentice- 

 ship sutistics. 



•• Hitl. MSS. Com. Rep. xii, app. 6, 

 p. 115. The petition is signed by four- 

 teen shoemakers. 



'» J. Donaldjon, A I'ievi of the State of 

 Agriculture of the County of Northampt. 



'" W. H. Holloway, Northampt. and 

 the Gieat IV ar, p. 205. 



•' rbid. pp. 207-8. 



" Northants. Journal of Commerce, May 

 1919, p. 8. 



•' Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. vol. 51, p. 290. 



" Nat. Hist, of Northants. p. 23. 



•' Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. vol. 100, p. 164, 

 cf. vol. 117, p. 550. 



•• History of Northampt. (by John Cole). 

 publ. by Birdsall, Northampt. 1815, p. 49. 



•' Northampt. Corp. Deeds, C. 14. 



•• MS. Vesp. E. xvii, fo. 18. 



' Rot. Huni. ii, i. 



• Assize R. 635, m. 63 d. 



" L. and P. Hen. Fill, vol xv, p. 563. 

 Of the two Quengions Mills one was a 



29 



fulling mill and the other a gygg mill. 

 (Inf. from Mr. Beeby Thompson.) 



'Assize R. 61;, m. 14. A Mervln 

 was grandfather of a donor to St. I^eonard's 

 Hospital, whose gift is dated 1190-4 by 

 R. M. Serjcantson. Lefer Hospitals of 

 Northampton, p. 4. 

 » Rot. Hund. ii, 3. 



• Dugdalc, Mon. v, 193. 



' Rot. Fin. 15 Edw. ITT, m. 23. 



• Ibid. ; also Assize R. 1187, m. 14 d. 



• Rot. Hund. ii, 3 ; Assize R. 615, m. 14. 

 This causeway was uncovered in 1889, in 

 course of excavations at the gas works. 



" Boro. Rec. ii, 291. " Ibid. 292. 



" See appendix to G. J. French, 

 Life of Crompton, which shows that Wyatt 

 was not, as stated in the previous 

 volume, the inventor. 



