A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



other burgesses. The other burgage was held 

 of the Prior of Durham by fealty and the pay- 

 ment of half a pound of pepper yearly. There 

 was usually also a small sum payable to the 

 bishop at the Tolbooth for landmale.^* In the 

 earlier deeds there is a distinction between an 

 ordinary tenement and a burgage, but this dis- 

 tinction later becomes lost." 



From the series of deeds in the Treasury at 

 Durham which are dated ' in curia burgi ' or 

 ' in plena curia burgi,' the first witnesses are 

 usually the bailiffs of the borough whose names 

 are followed by those of about half a dozen 

 other persons who, we may imagine, were bur- 

 gesses attending the court. These other per- 

 sons in turn appear later as bailiffs and the 

 former bailiffs fall into the position of ordinary 

 witnesses. There appear to have been three 

 bailiffs, and it is tempting to think that a new 

 bailiff was appointed each year to serve a term 

 of three years, but the evidence is too fragmen- 

 tary to confirm this view. Whether the bailiffs 

 were elected by the burgesses or appointed by 

 the bishop is not known. In 15 16-17 John Gowcr 

 was appointed by the bishop as the sole bailiff, 

 and after this date there was only one bailiff, 

 a salaried officer of the bishop holding office 

 for a considerable period. The bishop con- 

 tinued to appoint the bailiffs after the charters 

 of 1565 and 1602, as a result of which the scene 

 in the Tolbooth of 1609, already referred to, 

 occurred.^* 



In 161 7 John Richardson, steward of the 

 borough court, drew up an important though 

 strongly biassed statement as to the government 

 of the borough.^* He said that the city by 

 prescription and for three hundred years had 

 been governed by a bailiff appointed by letters 

 patent from the bishops at a yearly fee, who had 

 rendered his accounts yearly at the Exchequer 

 of Durham. This statement, however, cannot be 

 substantiated by documentary evidence, for no 

 patent appointing a bailiff can be traced earlier 

 than that granted to John Govver in 1516-17.*" 

 That the bailiff, he goes on to say, had for a like 

 time a steward who kept the courts for the city 

 and borough, received the profits and accounted 

 for them. 



It would appear that the earliest reference to 

 a steward of the borough court is to WiUiam 



6* In 1835 the mayor's wife received this sum. 

 Municip. Corp. Rep. p. 1514 ; Durh. Acct. R. (Surtees 

 Soc), 704. 



" D. and C. Rec. Repert. Magn. 



^8 See above, p. 35. 



s» Micldeton MS. lA, 10, 105. This statement 

 by Richardson was no doubt drawn up to rebut the 

 claims by the mayor on the occasion of the visit of 

 James I to Durham in 1617 (see above, p. 37). 



«« P.R.O. Durh. Rec. cl. 3, no. 70, m. 18. 



Fynimer appointed in 1447.'^ Thomas Roos 

 was appointed in 1457 with a fee of 26s. 8d. 

 payable by the bailiffs or farmers of the borough 

 out of the profits of the mill.*- In 1559 John 

 Taylfar had a grant of the reversion of the office 

 of steward or clerk of the courts of the boroughs 

 of Durham, Gateshead, Bishop Auckland and 

 Darlington on the death of Christopher Brown.*' 

 On the strength of Bishop Matthew's charter, 

 the mayor, aldermen and commonalty appointed 

 William Smyth of Gray's Inn, their steward to 

 hold the borough courts.** 



The bishops, Richardson continues, for a 

 like time had ordained ' Corporations and Socie- 

 ties of Arts and Mysteries,' and made certain 

 constitutions as to freedoms and fellowships 

 by fines, compositions and penalties which the 

 bailiff by his Serjeants and officers and by the 

 wardens and governors of the several trades 

 had received for the use of the bishops. The 

 government by a bailiff so continued, according 

 to Richardson, until 8 Elizabeth (1565), when 

 Laurence Haley, then bailiff and servant to 

 Bishop Pilkington, by agreement between him 

 and some of the citizens, petitioned the bishop 

 to have an alderman ordained for the govern- 

 ment of the city. The bailiff at the same time 

 assigned his grant of the bailiwick to these citi- 

 zens, and the bishop made them a grant of an 

 alderman and assistants. The alderman, who 

 retained also the office of bailiwick, held the 

 borough court before the bishop's steward and 

 took all profits of courts, landmales, rents, fines 

 of tradesmen, free tolls of fairs and markets in 

 the bishop's name, and accounted for them to 

 the bishop, paying the steward's fee and taking 

 the yearly allowance to the bailiff. This form 

 of government continued until about 42 Eliza- 

 beth (1600), when a certain 'religious gentleman 

 possessed of great personal estate,' who can be 

 identified with Henry Smith, the founder of 

 Smith's Charity,*^ conveyed his property ' to 

 good uses to the City of Durham.' The then 

 alderman and ' others of that Society,' being 

 his executors, misemployed the estate and com- 

 pounded with the then bishop for a grant of a 

 mayoralty. The bishop incorporated them by 

 the name of a mayor and alderman. Their 

 charter was confirmed by an inspeximus of the 

 King which they ' ignorantly conceive ' to be an 

 immediate grant from the Crown. Eventually 

 the bishop's successor made an inquiry as to 

 the misemployment of the funds and procured 

 a commission under the Statute of Charitable 



*i P.R.O. Durh. Rec. cl. 3, no. 43, m. 18. 

 62 Ibid. no. 45, m. 8. 

 *' Ibid. no. 77, m. 16. 



*■« Micldeton MS. lA, p. 103. For later stewards, 

 sec Surtees, op. cit. iv, pt. ii. 

 ** Ibid. p. 26. 



58 



