A HISTORY OF HERTFORDSHIRE 



Parndon and Roydon joins the Lea at Fieldes 

 Weir ^ about 2 miles above Broxbourne. The 

 narrow and winding water-course is at present 

 much silted-up and impracticable for barges of 

 greater burden than 50 to 60 tons, while the 

 locks are mainly of old pattern and occasionally 

 in poor repair. Malt is the chief cargo, but 

 agricultural produce, bricks and coal are 

 carried in small quantities. If larger barges 

 drawing more water could be used, the cost 

 would be much less. Some years ago the Stort 

 Navigation was acquired by Sir Walter Gilbey, 

 and is now in the hands of a small company. 



The River Lea becomes navigable at the 

 Town Mills,^ Hertford, and then passes Ware, 

 Stanstead Abbots, Broxbourne and Waltham 

 on its course to Limehouse, Bow Creek and the 

 Thames. From very early times it was the 

 highway by which the produce of Hertfordshire 

 reached the great city. On this account care 

 has been taken ^ to keep it open for traffic, 

 though even in the Middle Ages there were 

 complaints of silting and of obstructions caused 

 by mills, weirs and kiddles. At present the 

 28 miles of navigable river between Hertford 

 and the Thames are in good condition and can 

 be used by barges and hghters. But this 

 traffic suffers from the competition of steam 

 and motor lorries as well as of the Great Eastern 

 Railway. It has been suggested of late that 

 the Rivers Lea and Stort should be connected 

 by canal with Cambridge, and that thence by 

 means of the Cam and Ouse a hne of inland 

 navigation between London and King's Lynn 

 might be secured. This scheme is really a 

 revival of a former project of the London and 

 Junction Canal, for the making of which an Act 

 of Parliament was obtained on the eve of the 

 early railway activity, and probably on that 

 account allowed to lapse. The enterprise, if 

 carried out, would call for a thorough recon- 

 struction of the Stort Navigation as well as for 

 the making of the new Unking canal. Until 

 1869 the Lea Navigation was under the control 

 of the River Lea Trust, but on i April of that 

 year the Lea Conservancy Board took over 

 this responsibility. 



From a consideration of the chief means of 

 communication within the county we can now 

 pass to the industries themselves. Of these 

 malting is one of the oldest and most per- 

 sistent, and allusions to it are frequent in legal 



• 



21 H. R. De Salis, loc. cit. 



22 Ibid. 191. 



23 The principal Acts concerning the Lea Naviga- 

 tion are as follows : 3 Hen. VI, cap. 5 ; 9 Hen. VI, 

 cap. 9 ; 13 Eliz. cap. 18 ; 12 Geo. II, cap. 32 ; 7 

 Geo. Ill, cap. 5 1 ; 19 Geo. Ill, cap. 58 ; 45 Geo. Ill, 

 cap. 69 ; 13 & 14 Vict. cap. 109 ; 18 & 19 Vict, 

 cap. 196 ; 31 & 32 Vict. cap. 154 ; 37 & 38 Vict, 

 cap. 96 ; 57 & 58 Vict. cap. 205 ; and 63 & 64 Vict, 

 cap. 117. cf. Canal Returns (1907), App. 301. 



records. In 1339 we hear of a royal writ** to 

 the baihffs of Ware ordering the restitudon 

 of 12 quarters of malt which Master Reymond 

 Peregrine, an Itahan merchant and financier, 

 had caused to be provided at the prebend of 

 Leighton Bromswold for the expenses of his 

 house in London, since these had been seized 

 at Ware en route by John de Tebdych, a royal 

 purveyor. The trade in malt between Hert- 

 fordshire and London was considerable. About 

 1478 William Symmes, ' a comon cariour of 

 malte,' appealed ^ to the Court of Chancery for 

 redress. One John Pratte had hired him to 

 carry 6 quarters of malt to Stratford-le-Bow 

 to William Whitehead, brewer, who refused it 

 as ' not gode nor holesum for man.' The next 

 market-day Pratte met the carrier at Ware 

 ' and ther aresrid hym for the said malt, and 

 wolde condempne hym ther in 38^. contrarie to 

 all right and conscience.' The appellant begged 

 a writ of certiorari directed to the steward of 

 Ware. About the same time malting was an 

 industry at Aldenham,^* for Robert Mascall, a 

 maltman of that place, found himself accused 

 of abducting Joan Smythe, the apprentice of 

 Alexander Eldwolde, a London citizen. The 

 girl had already been in Mascall's service two 

 years, when on a visit to London, ' as he must 

 nedys do wekely by cause of his occupacion,' 

 her new master, who had engaged her at first 

 from ' compassion for goddys love and in way 

 of almes more than for any other cause,' was 

 arrested, Eldwolde affirming against him a 

 plaint of trespass. Apparently Mascall refused 

 to put himself on a verdict of a London jury 

 ' in a mater of which by no possibiUte of the 

 lawe the[y] myght have verrey notice,' and he 

 now applied for redress and enlargement to 

 the Chancellor. Another action of the same 

 period introduces Harry Hewet, maltman, who 

 in an action of debt brought by Matthew 

 Baldok, maltman, in the St. Albans Piepowder 

 Court, had been prevented from waging his law 

 by the abbot's steward." A rather later case 

 than these, which may be assigned to about 

 the year 1510, shows us Edward Wylson** 

 proceeding against John Archer of Ware for 

 the balance of a sum due for 20 quarters of 

 malt. It was alleged that the defendant in 

 the Common Pleas had waged his law ' for- 

 sweryng hymself upon a boke with xij other 

 vntrue men called knyghtes of the post that 

 he owed not the said residue.' Ware, Alden- 

 ham and St. Albans were only a few of the 

 Hertfordshire places noted for malt. In 15 14 

 Christopher Warde,^ a brewer, was appeaUng 



** Cal. Close, 1339-41, p. 135. 



'5 Early Chan. Proc. bdle. 46, no. 218. 



26 Ibid. no. 387. " Ibid. no. 463. 



28 Ibid. bdle. 369, no. 92. 



" Ibid. bdle. 376, no. 63. 



242 



