INDUSTRIES 



The latter clause in this title introduces yet 

 another grievance urged against the owners 

 and occupiers of iron-mills. 



To remedy the decay of the highways 

 which the carriage of coals, mine, and iron to 

 and from the ironworks was alleged to have 

 brought about, it was enacted that for every 

 ton of iron and every six loads of coals or 

 mine carried one mile through any of the 

 highways under the North Downs of Surrey 

 and Kent between 12 October and i May 

 in every year, the occupiers of the ironworks 

 should carry one load of cinder, gravel, stone, 

 sand or chalk for the repair of these roads, or 

 in lieu thereof should pay 35. 6d. for every 

 load. This was to be done under certain 

 penalties in accordance with the directions of 

 the justices of the peace or of the surveyors 

 of the highways. 



By the Act 39 Elizabeth, cap. 19, so 

 much of the preceding Act as related to the 

 repair of the roads was repealed, only however 

 for the introduction of a revised scheme. 

 During the period of the year before stated, 

 the owners or farmers of the mills were now 

 to pay 31. for every three loads of coal or 

 mine and for every ton of iron carried one 

 mile over any of the highways in the Wealds 

 of Sussex, Surrey or Kent. For the remain- 

 ing portion of the year, the period between 

 I May and 12 October, they were to find 

 one load of cinder, gravel, stone or chalk for 

 the repair of the road or 31. in lieu of every 

 such load, for every thirty loads of coals or 

 mine or for every ten tons of iron carried as 

 before stated. The justice of the peace 

 dwelling nearest the places ' most annoyed ' 

 was again to see to the due carrying out of 

 the provisions of the Act, or, in the event of 

 his failing to act, the surveyors of the high- 

 ways in the parish most affected. These 

 latter were subjected to a penalty of 40^. for 

 default of compliance with the statute. 



Such were the harassing restrictions with 

 which a shortsighted government attempted 

 to saddle an industry whose successful develop- 

 ment one would have thought would have 

 been recognized to be of the first necessity to 

 the country. Yet despite them all the 

 Wealden trade contined to grow, until in the 

 seventeenth century it probably attained its 

 greatest extent. To the bustling activity of 

 the Weald in Elizabethan times and the re- 

 sounding clang of its hammer mills the anti- 

 quary Camden bears testimony. A little 

 later, in 1612, Drayton poetically laments 

 the fast disappearance of the beautiful forest 

 trees.' On the authority of Fuller we have 



1 Drayton, Polyolbion. Song xvii. 



the before mentioned story of Count Gondo- 

 mar's attempt to obtain permission to export 

 to Spain iron guns of Sussex make, and this 

 although Camden had held Spanish iron to 

 be of superior quality to that produced in 

 England." In 1631 there is the statement 

 of the justices of the peace for Sussex, who 

 had been directed to take measures for the 

 relief of the poor in the 'wildish part' of 

 the rape of Pevensey, that great plenty of 

 work for men was afforded by the iron mills 

 there.^ We may safely assume that this 

 prosperity of the industry in the sister county 

 was accompanied with a corresponding pros- 

 perity in Surrey, and indeed in 1610 we 

 have, as we shall see later, in spite of all 

 the enactments to the contrary, evidence of 

 one new mill at least having then been 

 recently erected there. Moreover we know 

 that this new mill was worked right through 

 the seventeenth century until well past the 

 middle of the eighteenth. Yet so far as 

 the State Papers of the reigns of the first 

 two Stuarts are concerned the information 

 to be gathered as to the trade in the Weald 

 is of the most meagre, the government's 

 greater attention being apparently absorbed 

 by the works in the Forest of Dean. This 

 perhaps may have been due in great part 

 to the fact that the age was one of experi- 

 ments in smelting, a fact of which we shall 

 have to speak later, and the easier access to 

 the latter works from the coal-bearing districts 

 made them more available for experiments 

 with other kinds of fiiel than the charcoal 

 consumed in the Weald. 



The old restraining enactments however 

 remained in force during this period, though 

 probably with little effect where so many of 

 those engaged in the industry were amongst 

 the most influential persons in their counties. 

 Charles I., ever on the look out for means to 

 swell his revenues without the assistance of 

 his Parliament, found in the Court of Star 

 Chamber an instrument to secure the exaction 

 of the penalties imposed by the Elizabethan 

 statutes on those who manufactured iron con- 

 trary to their tenor. On 19 August 1636 

 he granted a commission to Sir David Cun- 

 ingham and certain others to treat and com- 



2 In a letter dated May 1598, written by John 

 Borrell to some unknown correspondent, he says 

 that ordnance was only made in the Peninsula at 

 Malaga, Lisbon, and the Groyne (Corunna), and 

 the supply did not suffice for the wants of the 

 King of Spain. According to the same writer all 

 seafaring men agreed ' that they never see no cast 

 ordnance of iron but such as be made in England' 

 (Cecil MSS.) 



' S. P. Dom. Chas. I. cxcii. 99. 



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