A HISTORY OF SURREY 



be interfered with. To lessen the general 

 inconvenience which such courses were likely 

 to bring about, the saltpetre men were ordered 

 to re-erect at their own charge any buildings 

 that might be pulled down or undermined in 

 the work, and to level the earth in all places 

 where they had dug. Disputes between them 

 and the owners of buildings thus disturbed had 

 to be referred to the arbitration of the justices 

 of the peace in the neighbourhood. No place 

 where the earth had been dug was to be again 

 worked within a certain nimiber of years. 

 When John Evelyn and his fellow patentees 

 tendered for a new patent in 1 604 they offered 

 to fix this period at six years, except in cases 

 of an unusually increased demand for powder.* 

 Four years seem to have been the recognized 

 limit. In the same tender pigeon-houses are 

 mentioned as ' the chiefest nurses of saltpetre 

 ot the kingdom.' That the pigeons might 

 not be unnecessarily disturbed the contractors 

 were willing to confine their operations to 

 a half hour in the day, and were prepared to 

 compensate the owners for any pair of pigeons 

 or any eggs lost. Charles I.'s proclamation 

 of 13 April 1625' allows the saltpetre men to 

 work two hours a day in the dove or pigeon 

 houses, but no longer, and then only at con- 

 venient times. That the saltpetre mines might 

 be maintained and increased, owners of pigeon 

 houses, stables and the like were at the same 

 time strictly prohibited from paving them with 

 stone or brick, flooring them with boarding or 

 laying them with anything but good and 

 mellow earth. 



At first the gunpowder makers were charged 

 with the business of producing their own salt- 

 petre, and by letters patent from the Crown 

 received their appointments of makers of salt- 

 petre and gunpowder. When in the reign of 

 James I., as we shall have occasion to show 

 more fully later, the duty of contracting for 

 the supply of both these commodities was 

 deputed to commissioners, afterwards to 

 become identified with the officers of the 

 Admiralty, the two functions were divided. 

 The kingdom was marked ofiF into districts for 

 the purposes of saltpetre making, each district 

 generally consisting of a group of two or more 

 counties. To each of these districts the 

 Commissioners of Saltpetre and Gunpowder 

 appointed a certain number of saltpetre men. 

 Sometimes, if not always, they were guided 

 in making these appointments by the recom- 

 mendation of their gimpowder contractor. A 

 certain quantity of saltpetre to be provided 

 every week was fixed for each district, the 



' S. P. Dom. Jas. I. ix. 68. 

 ' Pat. I Chas. I. pt. 4, No. gd. 



quantity varying in accordance with the extent 

 or estimated resources of the particular district. 

 Thus in 1630 we find that in some of the 

 districts the yield was expected to produce as 

 much as 10 cwt. weekly, while in others it was 

 fixed as low as i cwt.' 



It is not surprising that the adoption of such 

 drastic measures as we have described in order 

 to obtain the greatest possible production of 

 saltpetre should have provoked complaint. A 

 memorandum,* drawn up apparently for the 

 use of Sir Robert Cecil in the year 1600, of 

 the benefits of the manufacture of gunpowder 

 within the realm, refers to the discontent 

 which had been manifested in Parliament in 

 consequence of the necessity of dealing with 

 the grounds of the better sort ' not before 

 meddled with,' as well as with those of inferior 

 persons. ' The making of saltpetre,' it is 

 asserted, ' will be complained of, though per- 

 formed in the best manner that can be devised, 

 as breaking of earths and taking of carriages 

 needful by many of the ruder sort cause great 

 discontent.' Notwithstanding the proclama- 

 tion of 1625 complaints occur of difficulties 

 put in the way of the saltpetre men in their 

 efforts to supply the proportions assigned to 

 them. Thus in 1 634 one of the saltpetre men 

 sent up to the secretary of the Admiralty a 

 list of names of those people in Oxfordshire 

 and Warwickshire who had lately carried away 

 the earth from their pigeon houses.' Unless 

 some course was taken others, it was feared, 

 would do the same, and the saltpetre men in 

 consequence would be unable to supply their 

 proportions. On the other hand complaints 

 of the way in which the makers of saltpetre 

 performed their work are not wanting. Thus 

 in June 1637 the rector of Knoyle in Wilt- 

 shire, Dr. Christopher Wren, the father of the 

 great architect, exhibited to the commissioners 

 a bill for- damages done by digging for salt- 

 petre in the pigeon-house of the rectory.* 

 There had been two diggings, one about eight 

 years before, the other in March 1 636-7. On 

 the first occasion the pigeon-house, which was 

 built of massive stone walls twenty feet high, 

 was so shaken that the rector had to buttress 

 up one side. On the second occasion the 

 foundation was so undermined that the north 

 wall fell in. The saltpetre men had refused to 

 make any compensation. 



The other cause of the discontent resulting 

 from the establishment of the native manufac- 

 ture of saltpetre and gunpowder, and noticed 



3 S. P. Dom. Chas. I. clxv. 50. 

 ' Ibid. Eliz. cclxxv. 76. 

 ' Ibid. Chas. I. cclxxvii. 52. 

 « Ibid, ccdxi. 8. 



308 



