A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Walton or Walton. 

 Sahle three swam ar- 



of the wapentake of West Derby,"' and provided at 

 least one constable for the Castle of Liverpool ; "^ in 

 1 346 Richard de Walton held four burgages in Liver- 

 pool;"' or the Fazakerleys, or the Irelands of Hale, or 

 the Booties of Kirkdale, or 

 the hereditary reeves of West 

 Derby, all of whom held lands 

 in Liverpool. Among the 

 more purely burghal families 

 something might be said of 

 the Barons, the Corvesors, the 

 Longwros, the Mariotsons, the 

 Tippups. But two families 

 stand out in such marked pro- 

 minence as to deserve special 

 mention. The first of these 

 was the family of Liverpool, ^""' 

 which from the mere fact 



that it habitually used the place-name as its sur- 

 name may be supposed to have been settled in the 

 borough from a \try early date. In 1 346 the 

 various members of the family seem to hold among 

 them something like fifteen burgages,'" and the 

 Moore and Crosse deeds show them making constant 

 ac juisitions. The earliest notice of a member of this 

 family, Richard de Liverpool, occurs between 12IZ 

 and 1226;"' and it may be his son, or grandson, 

 who, as Adam son of Richard, is recorded as one of the 

 first Liverpool members of Parliament. From the 

 beginning of the 14th century their genealogy can be 

 traced in detail.'" Adam de Liverpool, who in 1346 

 held five and five- eighths burgages, had in 1332 paid a 

 larger sum towards the subsidy on goods than any 

 other person In Liverpool ; '" 

 and he was one of the jurors 

 in the Inquisition into the 

 earl's lands in 1346. His 

 father, his uncle, his brother, 

 and his nephews, each in their 

 generation appear in more or 

 less prominent positions. But 

 the most distinguished member 

 of the family was William son 

 of Adam, whose will has been 

 already referred to. He lived 

 through the period of the re- 

 vival of burghal liberties, dying 

 in 1383, and he played a principal part in securing this 

 remarkable advance. He was the first recorded mayor 

 of Liverpool in 1351, and though the list of mayors is 



Liverpool. Quarterly 

 gules and or a cross 

 formy argent. 



far from complete, he is known to have held the 

 office eleven times.'^ As mayor he received, and 

 probably took a large part in obtaining, the writ for the 

 erection of the chapel of St. Nicholas in 1356.'" In 

 I 3 5 7 he is named first among the lessees of the great 

 lease of the farm of the borough which forms so remark- 

 able a landmark in the history of burghal liberties."" In 

 1 3 6 1 he was rewarded by Duke Henry, for ' the good 

 and free service' which he had done, by the grant of 

 a pension of 20/. for life from the profits of a West 

 Derby manor.'" We have already seen him a tenant 

 of the principal mill of Liverpool. In addition he 

 owned a bakery in Castle Street,'" and seems to have 

 controlled a fishery, probably leasing from the duke 

 the weir which he had erected near Toxteth Park.'" 

 In short, he is at once the wealthiest and the most 

 public-spirited Liverpool burgess of his day.'** 



William de Liverpool left two sons, by different 

 wives, both named John, one of whom founded the 

 chantry of St. John in the Liverpool Chapel,'" perhaps 

 in memory of his father ; but his lands and his mill 

 presently passed into the hands of Richard de 

 Crosse, a son of his wife by another marriage.'" With 

 him begins the connexion with Liverpool of the Crosse 

 family, who are to play an exceedingly prominent part 

 in the affairs of the borough during the next century.'" 

 The other branches of the Liverpool family seem to 

 have adopted various surnames, especially William- 

 son '" and Richardson, and to have become indistin- 

 guishably merged in the mass of burgesses. 



The other principal Liverpool family of whom 

 mention must be made was 

 that of the Moores, for whom 

 their descendant Sir Edward 

 Moore claims that they were 

 established in Liverpool from 

 the earliest date.'" This claim 

 is probably not without justi- 

 fication if, as seems likely, 

 they took their name"" from 

 the moorish piece of ground 

 which lay to the north of 

 the upper end of the Pool, 

 at the end of Moor Street 

 or Tithebarn Street ; and we 

 may regard them as the rivals of the Liverpool 

 family throughout the first three centuries of the 

 borough's history. Their seat, More Hall, lay at 

 the northern end of the house-covered area, and 

 its gardens ran down to the estuary. When in 



Moore ui ivl o r e 

 Hall. Argent three 

 greyhounds courant in 

 pale sable collared or. 



1" See F.C.H. Lanes, iii, 3. 

 "2 Lane. Exch. R. 20 Edw. I. 



133 Extent of 1 346 already quoted. 



134 From the burgess roll appended to 

 the Extent of 13+6. But owing to the 

 dropping of the surname, it is not possible 

 to be certain in the allocation of their 

 lands. 



133 Margaret, relict of Adam de Garston, 

 married Richard de Liverpool between 

 1212 and 1226 ; Lanes, Inq, and Extents 

 (Rec. Soc), i, 128 ; Whalley Gaucher, 



579- 



1" Mr. Elton has given an account of 

 some of the principal members of the 

 family in his paper on ' William the son 

 of Adam,' Trani. //Kf. Sof. (new ser.) xix- 

 xx, 133. 



137 Exch. Lay Subsidies. 



188 Elton, * Early Recorded Mayors of 

 Liv.' Trans, Hist. Soc. (new ser.), xviii. 



13' Pat. 29 Edw. Ill ; see Okill, iv, 415. 



i''" Duchy of Lane. Chan. R. no. 2. 



"1 Close R. of Duke Henry, 52. 



l""^ Moore D. no. 257. 



i"*3 Ibid. * Quoddam gurgitum vocatum 

 le ffisheyard juxta parcum de Toxtath * 

 is mentioned in the Extent of 1346 (but 

 in no other document) as yielding 6s, per 

 annum. 



I*''' His will contains one of the few 

 personal notes surviving from the me- 

 diaeval period. * I bequeath my soul to 

 God and the blessed Virgin and all saints 

 and my body to be buried in the Chapel of 

 Liverpool before the face of the image of 

 the Virgin, where is my appointed place of 

 burial. I leave to be distributed in bread 

 on the day of my burial three quarters of 

 wheat. I leave six pounds of wax to be 

 used about my body. I leave to every 

 priest in the chapel of Liverpool fourpence. 



10 



I leave the rest of my goods to Katherine 

 my wife and our children born of her* ; 

 Crosse D. no. yy. 



1^' Raines, Lanes. Chantries (C3:iet, Soc. 

 lix), 82. 



"8 Add. MS. 32105, GG. 2301, 2840. 



1^7 Perhaps their mansion of Crosse 

 Hall, with its croft sloping down to the 

 Pool near the town's end on the south side 

 of Dale Street, may represent the original 

 home of William son of Adam. 



"3 In 1668 Sir E. Moore writes of 

 Richard Williamson and his relations. 

 ' There is a great faction of them . . . 

 They have always been enemies of me and 

 all yourpredecessors time out of the memory 

 of man' ; Moore Rental (ed. W. F. Irvine), 

 58 and note. 



l« Moore Rental (ed. W. F. Irvine), 8, 

 III. 



13° Moore D. 377 (120) et passim. 



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