INDUSTRIES 



law, Margaret the wife of Thomas Edsall of 

 Godalming, linen-weaver, and Elizabeth the 

 wife of George Trimming alias Charryott of 

 Godalming, woollen-weaver, the two indus- 

 tries being thus clearly distinguished. This 

 Thomas Edsall is no doubt identical with the 

 Thomas Edsall of Godalming, linen-weaver, 

 who was a party to a deed executed on 28 

 April 1736^ and whose estate was adminis- 

 tered in the Commissary Court of Surrey on 

 3 March 1736-7. The Edsall family seems 

 to have been engaged in the linen industry, 

 for Nicholas Edsall, the elder, of Godalming, 

 linen-weaver, by his will dated 20 December 

 1732,'' left the working tools and utensils be- 

 longing to his trade of linen-weaver to his 

 sons Thomas and Joshua. Nicholas appears 

 to have been the son of a Thomas Edsall of 

 Godalming, described as a weaver in a deed 

 of 1674, to which he was a party. Nicholas's 

 son Joshua continued his father's trade, but 

 his son and heir Joshua is described in a deed 

 of 1764 as a 'frame-worker.' Another 

 family, two members of which appear as 

 linen-weavers, is that of Purchase. Some 

 notice of earlier members of this family will 

 be found in our account of the dyeing indus- 

 try. By deeds dated 10 and 11 May 1750, 

 John Purchase of Great Bookham, linen- 

 weaver, only son and heir of John Purchase, 

 late of Godalming, linen-weaver, who died 

 intestate, conveyed a messuage near the mar- 

 ket house in Godalming, occupied by Judith 

 Purchase, widow. She was no doubt his 

 mother, as according to the Godalming regis- 

 ter John son of John ' Purchis ' and Judith 

 was baptized on 3 February 1707-8. 

 According to the same register one John 

 Purchase, senior, was buried on 8 October 

 1730. 



With the exception of George Maybank, 

 who is referred to in a deed of January 1766 

 as late of Godalming, linen-weaver, deceased, 

 these are all the notices which have been 

 found of the trade in this part of Surrey. It 

 is improbable that the industry which never 

 seems to have attained any considerable 

 extent was continued much after this latter 

 date. 



Although not strictly within the range of 

 the present subject notice may here be made 

 of an attempt made by a committee in 1691 

 to find employment for the poor of the parish 

 of St. Olave's, Southwark. An agreement 

 was come to with the proprietors of a linen 

 manufactory, and in 1 740, when an addition 

 to the workhouse of this parish became neces- 

 sary, 528 lb. of hemp and flax, which made 



' Prob. Archd. Ct. of Surr. 13 Dec. 1735. 



503 lb. of thread, producing as many ells of 

 cloth, of which 139 shirts and shifts and 

 more than twenty pairs of sheets were made, 

 were spun, in addition to twenty-seven sacks 

 of wool, by the poor maintained in this 

 house.' 



An industry of very much greater extent 

 was that of the frame-work knitters, which 

 appears during the eighteenth century, when 

 the old cloth trade of the neighbourhood was 

 in decay, to have largely taken the place of 

 that manufacture as one of the common 

 means of livelihood for the inhabitants of 

 Godalming and the adjacent villages. Many 

 of the families who appear at this period to 

 have been engaged in frame-work knitting 

 are already familar to us as having been 

 prominently engaged in the previous century 

 in the cloth trade. Amongst such families 

 are those of Chitty, Woods, Toft, Shrubb, 

 Monger and Hooke.^ 



The earliest instance of a frame-work knit- 

 ter at Godalming that has come to our notice 

 occurs in Isaac Fortrie, who is so described 

 in a deed dated 26 January 1681-2, when he 

 purchased some property at Godalming. He 

 was probably the son of a late vicar of the 

 parish. 



Of the Chittys, Richard Chitty of Witley, 

 described as a silk stocking weaver, was one 

 of the executors in 1 7 1 5 of the will of John 

 Chandler of Witley, yeoman.* He is pro- 

 bably to be identified with the Richard Chitty 

 the elder of Milford, frame-work knitter, 

 whose will was proved on 21 August 1725' 

 His son was John Chitty, also engaged in the 

 same industry at Milford, whose will dated 

 6 July 1765 was proved 12 November 1770. 

 Another Richard Chitty of Milford, frame- 

 work knitter, is mentioned in 1767. John 

 Chitty the elder, a frame-work knitter of 

 Godalming, whose will bears date 3 August 

 1721,° appears in his burial entry in the 

 register on 13 January 1721—2 as John 

 Chitty, senior, stocking-maker. James Chitty, 

 also a Godalming frame-work knitter, makes 

 a bequest in his will dated 3 1 March 1 748 ° 

 of two stocking frames to Nicholas the son 

 of Joshua Edsall. 



2 Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surrey, iii. 600, 

 601. 



3 The editor is indebted to Mr. Woods for the 

 notices from wills, deeds, etc., of the foUovfing 

 and many other frame-work knitters of Godalming 

 and the neighbourhood in the eighteenth and 

 early nineteenth centuries, proving the then con- 

 siderable extent of the industry. 



* Prob. Archd. Ct. of Surr. 13 Oct. 1715. 

 6 Ibid. 23 June 1722. 

 » Ibid. 23 April 1748. 



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