SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



VII — The Boroughs 



In the report of the commission on municipal corporations, five boroughs 

 were recognized in the modern county of Durham. These were Durham, 

 Hartlepool, Sunderland, Gateshead, and Stockton, but at least two others. 

 Bishop Auckland and Darlington, appear in the Durham documents. Little 

 is known of any of the seven ^ before the time of Bishop Hugh Pudsey 

 (1153-95), who sold charters to Durham, Sunderland, Gateshead, and more 

 doubtfully perhaps to Darlington, Stockton, and Bishop Auckland. The 

 difficulty is that most of these charters have disappeared, and the character 

 of the two best-known survivors, those of Wearmouth (Sunderland) and 

 Gateshead, makes us hesitate in accepting any early claims to municipal self- 

 government in Durham. 



Pudsey's charters to Gateshead and Sunderland ** point to Newcastle as 

 the model upon which the rights were based, apparently referring to 

 Henry I's charter,' but the burgesses of Gateshead, for example, are only 

 guaranteed certain vague forest rights like those enjoyed by Newcastle, and 

 it is remarkable that none of the towns of the Palatinate, save perhaps 

 Hartlepool, could produce a charter for real self-government of an earlier date 

 than the sixteenth century. Traditions of past greatness there might be, but 

 except at Hartlepool and Durham mayors and aldermen had doubtful legal 

 claims to their titles in 1835. Hartlepool was the only royal borough in the 

 Palatinate. It could point to a charter from King John in 1201 guaranteeing 

 it the rights of Newcastle,* and although in 1230 Bishop le Poor forced it to 

 accept a charter from him, the terms were fairly liberal. It obtained a mayor 

 and the only gild-merchant in the county. 



Thanks to the rival claims made upon its allegiance by the bishop, the 

 king, and the powerful family of Bruce, the town of Hartlepool managed to 

 retain a fair degree of independence and self-government, but the other towns, 

 even Durham, were less fortunate. Down almost to modern times the bishop's 

 bailiff or similar officer took the place of the mayor in all the other 

 boroughs except Durham, for even the mayor of Stockton did not possess 

 undivided control of the town, as the borough only comprised one-fourth of the 

 manor. At Gateshead the bailiff was appointed by the bishop until 1681. 

 After that date no bailiff was appointed. Two stewards ^ elected by the bur- 

 gage holders and freemen managed the borough property subject to half- 

 yearly meetings of their electors, while the manor court, the justices of the 

 peace, and, above all, the curious select vestry known as the ' Four and 

 twenty ' provided such government of the town as there was. In 1835 the 

 burgage holders of Gateshead were content to explain their title as a question 

 of tenure and denied that there ever was a borough corporate at Gateshead. 

 Even Durham had to wait for its real charter until the time of Bishop 

 Pilkington in 1565. Before that there was the usual vague charter of 

 Pudsey, but even a confirmation by Pope Alexander III did not increase its 



' Simeon of Durham says that the Usurper Cumin in 1 140, on the death of Geoffrey Rufus, forced certain 

 burgesses to take an oath of fidelity to him ; Symeon of Durham, Opera (Rolls Ser.), i, 14.6. 



^ Printed in App. to Boldon Book (Surtees Soc. xiv). 



' Printed in Stubbs' Select Chart, iii. * Ibid. 313. 



' Mackenzie says that the churchwardens fulfilled the duties of stewards until the latter were appointed 

 in 1695 ; Hist, of Newcastle and Gateshead, ii, 748. 



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