A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



The first interference with the condition of the labourers was entirely in 

 the interests of the employers, to keep down wages and secure a larger 

 supply of labour, but nevertheless it was very closely connected with the 

 later poor laws. The Statute of Labourers restrained the liberty of the giver, 

 who was forbidden to give alms to able-bodied beggars, in order that they 

 might be forced to work for their living. In 1388 an Act of Parliament 

 admitted the right of those who could not work to relief, but restrained the 

 movements of all beggars and labourers. Servants who wished to leave their 

 hundred, either for change of work or for a pilgrimage, could only do so 

 when they had obtained a letter duly signed by the head man of the hundred. 

 Anyone, whether beggar or labourer, found wandering without such a letter 

 was to be put in the stocks and kept there until a surety was found for his 

 return. Even impotent beggars might not wander about the country, but 

 must obtain support in their own neighbourhood. At the same time various 

 Acts were passed for controlling religious endowments, which were continu- 

 ally diverted from their original objects. 171 



In Henry VII's reign there were further enactments against beggars 

 and vagabonds, with less severe punishments, but probably the offenders were 

 not very numerous. The views of frankpledge give little evidence that 

 the vagrancy question caused much difficulty, but at Newport Pagnel, 178 the 

 case of a vagrant who was punished according to the statute was interesting 

 from the rarity of such a presentment at a court-leet in the next reign. 



In the sixteenth century a great change came over the attitude of the 

 government. The question was no longer one of forcing men to work for 

 lower wages, but of providing work for the unemployed and food for them 

 at a reasonable price. This change was due to the great increase of vagrancy 

 resulting from various causes, but in Buckinghamshire undoubtedly from the 

 inclosure of arable land and its conversion to pasture and the consequent loss 

 by the evicted tenants of both houses and work. 



How far the monasteries before the Dissolution had effectually relieved 

 the distress it seems impossible to estimate, but they were for the 

 most part very small and poor. 174 Few but Notley Abbey and perhaps 

 Missenden could have given sufficient alms to relieve on any large scale, so 

 that probably the unemployed labourers had from the first swelled the large 

 body of vagrants. The rise in prices, due to the debasement of the coinage 

 in the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI and to the influx of silver to 

 the country, affected food before wages, and therefore the condition of men 

 who were in employment was comparatively much worse than had been 

 the case. 



The crisis in the cloth trade must have affected Buckinghamshire less 

 than the neighbouring counties, though in some places a considerable 

 number of men were engaged in the trade, particularly at Wycombe. 

 In the municipal records of the town in the reign of Henry VIII there is an 

 order for weavers and fullers very much more stringent than the only earlier 

 order 175 extant, by which weavers were to be quit of all dues to the Gild. 

 of Merchants excepting stallage in the market. The later order 176 laid 



m e.g. Hospitals at Wjrcombe and New-port Pagnel. "* P.R.O. Ct. R. ptfo. 153, No. I. 



174 Cf. value of different monasteries at the time of the Dissolution ; Dugdale, Mm. 



m Municipal Records of Chepping Wycombe. I7t Ibid. temp. Hen. VIII. 



72 



