A HISTORY OF SURREY 



clerk to be appointed senior and acting coroner, the 

 junior bailiff being junior coroner, a sinecure post. 



A court of record appears to have been held here 

 as early as 1234-5, wnen Ralf de How questioned an 

 essoin under a writ de recto ; *" it was formally granted in 

 1481, and was to be held every Saturday before the 

 bailiffs and steward of the town, with cognizance of 

 all pleas of debt, covenant, trespass, and personal 

 matters within the demesne of the town and the 

 hundreds of Kingston and Emley bridge.*" This 

 privilege was extended in 1628 *" to the hundreds of 

 Copthorne and Effingham, and the court continued 

 to be held until the end of the i8th century. 50 * The 

 court leet was part of the old manorial organization, and 

 in the early igth century was still held before the 

 recorder on Tuesday in Whitsun week, when the 

 Fifteens were the jury.*" Its jurisdiction at one time 

 extended throughout the hundred, 304 but the corpora- 

 tion surrendered their powers in Richmond, Petersham, 

 Kew, Ham, and Effingham to Charles I in i628. 805 

 The court baron, at which presentment of the death 

 of free tenants and the alienation of free tenements 

 was made, was held before the bailiffs on Tuesday in 

 Whitsun week ; the gownsmen and peers formed the 

 homage, and also signed the presentment of the leet 

 jury.* 06 In 1556 a court of pie-powder was granted 

 with the fair, but does not appear ever to have been 

 much exercised, and had fallen into disuse by 1835.*" 

 The petty and quarter sessions were, in 1835, held 

 concurrently with the court leet, the bailiffs being ex 

 officio justices of the peace. 



There were also Trades Companies, which were 

 certainly established in the town by 1579, when 

 certain constitutions were enacted which practically 

 remained in force until the igth century. 308 The 

 freemen of the town were divided into the four 

 companies of mercers, woollen drapers, shoemakers 

 or cordwainers, and butchers, later victuallers, whose 

 ' arms ' may still be seen in the painted glass of the 

 town hall. Each company was constituted in the 

 same way, and consisted of a body of freemen governed 

 by two wardens, with a clerk and a beadle. 309 The 

 freemen of the companies were distinct from the 

 freemen of the corporation, and were either ' appren- 

 tices bound to and serving a freeman in the town, or 

 the eldest son living of a freeman upon the death of 

 his father,' or freemen of the corporation, who could 

 claim the freedom of one of the companies either on 

 or after election. 310 In 1835 a member of either of 

 these classes paid 6s. 8d. on admission to his freedom, 

 but in 1635-7 the normal fee paid by apprentices 

 was 3/. 4<j'. s " The names of the freemen were 

 entered in roll books, 3 " now no longer extant ; the 

 number of admissions yearly was considerable in the 

 early 1 7th century, but diminished after the Restora- 

 tion, the membership being sixty in 1835. The two 

 wardens were elected every year by the freemen of 

 the Company ; it was their duty to keep the accounts, 



to act as treasurers generally, and to be present at the 

 signing of indentures of apprenticeship in the trades 

 under their control. 313 They had power to impose 

 fines and distrain for breaches of their orders."' The 

 town clerk acted as clerk of each company, receiving a 

 fee of 5/.* 16 Each company generally met but once 

 a year by special summons, though sometimes as many 

 as six meetings were held, 816 and an item would appear 

 in the accounts such as ' expended at 2 several times 

 in wyne at the Sarazen's Head.' 3I7 The greatest 

 expense of the year was generally the money 'spent on 

 the Company at the Dinner' on Easter Monday, the 

 ' feast-day ' on which the outgoing wardens presented 

 the accounts of each company to the bailiff at the 

 Gildhall before the newly-elected wardens and divers 

 other freemen of the company. 



None of the companies possessed property, and 

 their revenues were derived solely from the fees paid 

 by newly-elected freemen, from fines for breach of the 

 orders, postponement of the swearing-in of apprentices, 

 and from quarterages due from each freeman. 3 " 

 According to the by-law the quarterage of a house- 

 holder was 8J., that of a journeyman %d., but by 1835 

 8</. was paid by married and \d. by single men ; 3 " 

 in 1 609 the quarterage paid to the Mercers' Company 

 was i$s. Afd. for the past year, while the woollen 

 drapers received 2O/. 8</. But though the expenses 

 usually nearly balanced the receipts, as in the case of 

 the woollen drapers, whose receipts in 1655 were 

 2 lt)s. -md expenditure 2 ijs, "jd., in 1688 the 

 Court of Assembly was able to borrow 1 6 i o;. from 

 the victuallers, 17 of the mercers, and 26 lot. of 

 the cordwainers, 2O/. of which was repaid in ' brass 

 money.' M0 



The companies were very dependent on the Court 

 of Assembly, which kept their money stored in ' a 

 chest with four boxes and six locks and keys for the 

 four companies' bought in 1609-10."' The regula- 

 tion of the trade of the town was really in the hands 

 of the Court of Assembly, which in 1638 re-enacted 

 orders of 1579 prohibiting any but freemen of the 

 companies from exercising any trade, science or 

 mystery, or keeping open shop or selling by retail 

 within the town under penalty of 6s. SJ. for each 

 offence and the like sum for every market-day he 

 continued to transgress. 3 " This seems to indicate 

 that market-days were not like fair days, free, and in 

 1 609 the Company of Mercers twice distrained Henry 

 Woodfall for trading in the town contrary to orders, 

 and spent \d. in twice carrying his stall into the 

 court-hall. 3 ' 3 The Court of Assembly, moreover, 

 reserved to itself the right of granting life-tolerations 

 to those who were not freemen on payment of sums 

 varying in 1835 between 5 and /3O."* These 

 tolerations became increasingly common after the 

 Restoration, and brought the corporation into conflict 

 more than once with the wardens of the companies, as 

 in 1682, when the wardens of the Company of 



499 Maitland, Bracton's Note Bk,, no. 

 1122. 



800 Roots, Charters, 50. 



801 Ibid. 174. 



808 Manic. Corf. Com. Ref. iv, 2900. 

 Information kindly given by the town- 

 clerk, Mr. H. C. Winser. 



808 Munic. Corf, Com. Rep. iv, 2900. 



Doc. of Corp. Ch. Bks. 



<**Cal. S.P. Dam. 1628-9, P- 4 i 

 Roots, Charters, 210. 



306 Munic. Corf. Com. Rtf. iv, 2900. 



"W Roots, Charters, 77. 



808 Munic. Corf. Com. Rep. iv, 2898. 



809 Bk. of Trades Companies. 

 * w Mur.ic. Corf. Com. Rep. iv, 2898. 



811 Bk. of Trades Companies, Shoe- 

 makers, 1635-7. 



812 Ibid. Woollen Drapers, 1640. 

 818 Ibid. Mercers, 1670. 



814 Ibid. Woollen Drapers, 1609; Ct. 

 of Assembly Bk. 6, 29 July 1682. 

 814 Bk. of Trades Companies, passim. 

 816 Ibid. Woollen Drapers, 1630-40. 



500 



81 "Ibid. Mercers, 1631. 



818 Bk. of Trades Companies, Woollen 

 Drapers, 16 n. 



819 Munic. Corp. Com, Ref. iv, 2898. 



820 Ct. of Assembly Bk. 28 Oct. 1685. 

 "Bk. of Trade Companies, Shoe- 

 makers, 1 6 10. 



8M Munic. Corf. Com. Ref. iv, 2898. 

 888 Bk. of Trades Companies, Mercers, 

 1609. 



8M Munic. Corf. Com. Rep. iv, 2898. 



