A HISTORY OF DORSET 



county or district collecting the Lord Admiral's profits or maintaining his 

 rights. The officers in question, the vice-admirals of the counties, were, in 

 their civil functions, the descendants historically of the keepers of the coast 

 and the conservators of truces of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and 

 there is not one of the duties of the vice-admirals which cannot be paralleled 

 among those performed by their predecessors. Now, instead of acting 

 temporarily, or subject to the hostile influence in Parliament of the mercantile 

 classes, they became a band of crown officials stationed round the whole 

 coast, supported by the power of the Tudor despotism and continued without 

 any interruption during which their authority might diminish by discon- 

 tinuance of action.^'" It was practically a new police measure and, on the 

 whole and under normal conditions, attained its object by rendering the 

 difficulties of preparation, the chances of detection, and the probabilities of 

 punishment greater so far as shipping set out with a criminal intent was con- 

 cerned ; while the vice-admirals' officers kept a close watch on the more 

 evilly-disposed inhabitants of the coast who had hitherto helped pirates or 

 indulged in wrecking with impunity. 



The scheme did not come into operation simultaneously over all 

 England but developed out of necessity and according to opportunity. The 

 first nomination known by precise date is that for Norfolk and Suffolk in 

 1536; within a few years other vice-admirals were acting in most of the 

 counties. Sir Hugh Paulet holding the appointment for Somerset and Dorset. 

 The two counties were soon separated, and during the remainder of the 

 century the Ashleys, the Howards of Bindon, Sir Christopher Hatton, and 

 Carew Ralegh held the office. Hatton obtained wreck rights in the 

 Isle of Purbeck for himself ; "^ Carew Ralegh filled the office between 

 1592 and 1603, when his appointment was revoked on account of some 

 arrangement he had made with his deputy, John Randall. This man, 

 Randall, was a thorn in the flesh for Poole ; the exemptions of the town 

 were too firmly based on the patent of 1526 to be really questioned, but 

 Randall was in control at Brownsea, and in many ways, there and ashore, 

 annoyed the corporation. The troubles of Weymouth have already been 

 referred to. In 1 570 the bailiffs withdrew all claim to admiralty jurisdic- 

 tion except in relation to such disputes as originated in the town between 

 burgesses ; "' subsequently the union of Weymouth and Melcombe under 

 charter may have infused fresh courage, for between 1590 and 1600 the 

 tension between the two towns and the Lord Admiral was acute. In 1593 

 the mayor and others were cited before the Admiralty Court in London ; 

 what they had to expect there may be inferred from the Lord Admiral's order 

 to the judge to arrest them as soon as they appeared on a charge of receiving 

 pirates' plunder.^*' In 1597, again, the town officers were in trouble for 

 neglecting press warrants ; in the same year 23 of the principal inhabitants 

 signed a protest complaining of the action of the previously mentioned 

 John Randall.^'* The Weymouth claim, if exercised, was never admitted 

 by the Lord Admiral or the Privy Council,"' but the attitude of the 



"" The patents of appointment were from the Lord Admiral, sometimes for life and sometimes during 

 pleasure. I am indebted to Mr. R. G. Marsden, who has made a special study of the history of the evolution 

 of the vlce-admiralship (see Engl. Hist. Rev. July, 1907), for much information on this subject. 



'■■ Pat. 14 Eliz. m. 9. '" Add. MSS. 12505, fol. 173. '" Ibid. fol. 392. '» Ibid. fol. 423, 441. 

 Cott. MSS. Vesp. F. ix, fol. 247 ; Jcls ofP.C. xvi, 406 ; 26 July, 26 Aug. 1565. 



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