CITY OF DURHAM 



Duchess of ' Mazarene ' who came from beyond 

 sea that year and brought ' the garb of mantoes ' " 

 with her. Another said that the tailors, or the 

 major part of them, did not understand ' the 

 art of mantoe-making ' so well as women. She 

 had some spoiled by a man tailor in Durham 

 and believed that the women tailors ' are greatest 

 artists at women's work than men tailors.' The 

 suit is valuable^ as showing the kind of thing 

 that was bound to take place when local require- 

 ments outran narrow local means of supply. 

 It also shows, perhaps, that the Durham ladies 

 were anxious to encourage local industries in 

 order to serve their own convenience. 



About the same time a scheme was mooted 

 which, if carried out, would have had large 

 influence upon Durham trade and life. As 

 early as 1705 the great Wear scheme was first 

 propounded. In that year an entry in the 

 books of the important company of ' Mercers, 

 Grocers, Haberdashers, Ironmongers, and 

 Salters,' founded or re-founded by Pilkington 

 in 1561, records that a sum was paid 'for 

 completing the petition and bill for making the 

 Wear navigable.' " The undertaking floated like 

 a vision before the imagination of the citizens 

 for the best part of a century. It reappeared in 

 1717, in 1754,^' ^'^^ '^ 1796. when it was 

 finally abandoned. The petition alluded to does 

 not seem to be traceable, but there is fuller 

 light for the later stages of the proposal. An 

 Act of 171 7 appointed a commission for twenty- 

 one years to carry out a scheme for making the 

 Wear navigable up to Durham. It was stated 

 that shoals and sand would have to be removed 

 between Chester-le-Street and Durham with 

 locks, dams, sluices and cuts. It was urged 

 that navigation to the city would benefit trade 

 and the poor, encouraging the woollen manu- 

 factory, providing carriage of lead, coals, lime, 

 stone, timber, deals, butter, tallow, etc., to and 

 from Durham, Westmorland, Cumberland, 

 Yorkshire, and other counties to and from 

 Sunderland, London, and other parts, British and 

 foreign, tending to the employment and increase 

 of watermen and seamen, and preserving the 

 highways. The corporation took up the scheme 

 with something like enthusiasm,^* and were 



ready to place the accommodation of boats of 

 twenty tons burden or more. When the ques- 

 tion came up finally in i796,«o it was merged 

 with the much more extensive project of pro- 

 viding water conveyance between the German 

 Ocean and the Irish Sea, which was to link up 

 connections at various points with the different 

 northern cities. Plans and estimates were 

 prepared. A canal was to be cut from the 

 Tyne to Chester-le-Street, whence the idea of 

 1754 was to be carried out. The vision charmed 

 the more enterprising business men of the north, 

 but it put no money into the pockets of any. 

 Steam traction, which was at this time coming 

 within the range of possibility, was destined 

 ultimately to take the place of this elaborate 

 design of water communication. 



There was some zeal for education in Durham 

 during the i8th century. Durham School, 

 rebuilt in 1661, on the Palace Green, soon 

 became, instead of a local grammar school, a 

 north-country public school of repute and wide 

 influence. We can trace from the Restoration 

 onwards not only the familiar city names such as 

 Salvin, Wilkinson, Hutchinson, Blakiston, Faw- 

 cett, Greenwell, Tempest, but representatives 

 of the historic families of Northumberland and 

 Durham, e.g., Hilton, Vavasour, Burdon, Grey, 

 Shafto, Blackett, Forster, Heron, Lambton, 

 Bowes, Calverley, Cole. One of the chief dis- 

 tinctions of the school is the succession of local 

 historians and antiquaries who drew their inspira- 

 tion from the venerable association of the old 

 school on the Green. Most famous of these is 

 James Mickleton (1638-93), without whom no 

 history of mediaeval or 17th-century Durham 

 would be possible.*! Local history owes very much 

 to Elias Smith, a notable head master (1640-66) 

 who did his best to preserve the cathedral library 

 through the Protectorate troubles, and to 

 Thomas Rudd, headmaster (1691-9 and 1 709-1 1), 

 who indexed the Cathedral manuscripts. Later 

 than these comes Thomas Randall (head master 

 1 761-8), who made a large collection of manu- 

 script material for local history. 



There existed on the opposite side of the 

 Palace Green a smaller school of ancient founda- 

 tion ' for the bringing up of young children, and 



*^ Mentioned, too, in Hudibras. See Knu Engl. Die. 



^ The suit is summarized in Arch. Ael. ii, 166. 

 A peculiarity of the Drapers' Company is that it 

 admits all sons of a freeman to the privilege. Thus 

 the gild has always been powerful by reason of 

 number."!. 



" Quoted in Surtees, op. cit. iv, 23. 



'* A summary of the draft Act of 1754 is given in 

 Arch. Ad. ii, 118. 



'^ The Gild took their share in forwarding the 

 enterprise (Surtees, op. cit. iv, 25). The Corporation 

 at this time were lengthening their cords and strength- 

 ening their stakes. The enlarged and improved town 



haU was completed in 1754. Private enterprise was 

 also stimulated, for in the same year James Appleby, a 

 local chemist, broached to the Admiralty liis scheme 

 of making salt water fresh. {Table Book, Gent. Mag. 

 xxiv, 44.) 



60 M. A. Richardson's Table Book, 1796, 1797. 



*i Mickleton WTOte ' De SchoUs Dunelm,' an ac- 

 count which still exists in the Mickleton MS. xxxvi in 

 the University Library. It was copied and augmented 

 by RandaU (Randall's MS. [Doc. of D. and C. of 

 Dur.]). On this and further research was based the 

 description in V.C.H. Dur. i, 381. See too Earle and 

 Body, Preface to Dur. School Reg. (1912). 



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