INDUSTRIES 



house in Fullerstrete, a russet cloth worth ^os. 

 The townsmen made a general levy to raise 

 funds for htigation, and also assembled in a 

 body to meet Queen Eleanor when she came to 

 visit the abbey. The abbot endeavoured to 

 outwit them by bringing the queen round by a 

 different way, but the townsmen and the 

 women, ' whose attack was formidable since 

 it is hard to put reasonable bounds to the 

 anger of women,' forced their way in and 

 appealed to her. The queen rebuked the 

 abbot for trying to keep the people from her, 

 but, whatever her feelings may have been in 

 the matter, the law was on the side of the abbot, 

 and although the townsmen appealed against 

 the first verdict the retrial resulted in the 

 confirmation of the abbot's claim. The dispute 

 broke out again early in the reign of Edward III, 

 when the townsmen succeeded in extorting 

 from the abbot a charter giving them the right 

 to full their cloth elsewhere than at the abbey 

 mill. This, however, they soon had to relin- 

 quish.^* 



A list of tradesmen" drawn up for some 

 purpose in the reign of Edward III gives twelve 

 weavers, six fullers and five dyers in St. Albans 

 and three weavers and three fuUers in Hert- 

 ford. Another list of persons fined for infring- 

 ing various trade regulations in 1355 names at 

 St. Albans eleven weavers, five fullers and two 

 dyers and at Hertford three fullers ; two dyers 

 are mentioned at Buntingford and a fuller at 

 Ware. There were also nine wool merchants 

 at Baldock.^** In the next reign the number of 

 the Hertfordshire clothworkers was small, and 

 their output insignificant compared with many 

 counties. The accounts of the subsidy of 4^. 

 on every broadcloth for the year 18-19 

 Richard II " show the names of twenty-seven 

 producers in St. Albans, of whom the chief were 

 Thomas Carter, with fifteen cloths ; Robert West, 

 with ten ; John Halgate and John Hawkwode, 

 with five each. Hertford had only five names, 

 Berkhampstead thirteen, but all responsible 

 for very small amounts, Ashwell and Hitchin 

 fifteen, of whom none produced more than four 

 cloths, and Buntingford with Royston thirty- 

 six names, of whom William Serle had six 

 cloths, but no one else more than three. The 

 total amount of cloth produced for sale in the 

 county during the year was 198 cloths, or the 

 equivalent, for a considerable part of the 

 output consisted of narrow ' dozens,' of which 

 four were equal to one whole cloth. In the 

 similar account for 21-2 Richard II ^^ there are 

 thirty-two makers of whole cloths, averaging 



^' Chan. Misc. bdle. 62, file 5, no. 198. 

 " Exch. K.R. Accts. bdle. 399, no. 14. 

 1^^ Coram Rege R. 377. 

 " Exch. K.R. Accts. bdle. 342, no. 8. 

 " Ibid. no. II. 



two each, not assigned to any particular towns, 

 but of the three largest producers — John Sextry, 

 with ten cloths, John Hawkewode and Thomas 

 Carter, with nine each — the two last-named 

 occurred in the earlier list as belonging to St. 

 Albans. In the same list, under ' narrow 

 cloths,' Royston had sixteen names (four of 

 whom, including William Serle, produced twelve 

 ' dozens ' or upwards), Baldock three, Bunting- 

 ford two, Hitchin and Codicote ten; Stortford, 

 Hertford and Ware, together, eight. In the 

 account for 3-4 Henry IV" only nine names 

 are given for the whole county, the largest 

 amount, nine ' dozens ' of narrow cloth, being put 

 down to Simon Sebern of Hitchin, which town 

 Lewis in his Topographical Dictionary (1849) 

 says was ' celebrated at an early period for 

 woollen goods.' His further statement that 

 ' many of the merchants of Calais resided in 

 the place prior to the removal of that branch 

 of business from the towns on the continent ' 

 cannot be verified. 



Some idea of the cloths manufactured may 

 be gleaned from cases in which pieces were 

 forfeited for neglect of the regulation by which 

 all cloth exposed for sale had to be sealed by 

 the ulnager, or for other reasons. At St. Albans 

 in 1423 were seized ^ 6 yards of red cloth worth 

 5 J., 1 1 yards of ' lyght blew medley ' worth gs., 

 15 yards of ' persed blew' worth 155'., 12 yards 

 of green worth 12s., 4 yards of light blue worth 

 2s. 8d., 8 yards of white russet cloth worth 5^-. 

 and 4 yards of black russet cloth worth 2s. ^d. 

 In 1440 the forfeitures returned were nine 

 pieces of woollen cloth of divers colours called 

 ' remenaunts ' belonging to John Panfeld of 

 Stortford, and two pieces of narrow russets of 

 Walter Helder of Buntingford.^ Rather earlier, 

 in 1396, the ulnage accounts ^^ include a payment 

 from John Stowe for ' a dozen of broad cloth of 

 stout blanket {de robusto blanketto).' John 

 Studley of St. Albans is described as a ' strayl- 

 wever ' in 1438,''* ' strayle ' being apparently a 

 coarse sort of blanketing used for bedclothes. 

 Almost the only other reference to material 

 occurs in a long list of cloths forfeited in London 

 in the early years of Elizabeth. Hopkin Albre, 

 clothier, of Hertford (the only Hertfordshire 

 name in the list), was fined for a ' fryse,' or 

 frieze cloth, lacking one pound in weight.^* 



Whether the absence of other Hertfordshire 

 names from this list of defaulting clothiers was 

 due to their greater honesty or the smallness of 

 their output may be left uncertain, but it would 

 seem that even the small amount of cloth- 



19 Exch. K.R. Accts. bdle. 342, no. 17. 



20 Ibid. no. 20. 



21 Ibid. no. 21. 



22 Ibid. no. II. 



*5 Herts. Gen. and Antiq. ii, 238. 



^ Memo. R. (Exch. K.R.), Hil. 7 Eliz. m. 331 



249 



32 



