AMOUNDERNESS HUNDRED 



PRESTON 



endowment, derived from burgages and lands in 

 Preston and Fishwick, was only £$ zs. id. a year. 235 

 A school can be traced back to the 1 4th century. 236 

 Its connexion with a chantry threatened its exis- 

 tence, 237 but it seems to have been preserved by the 

 corporation, and under their care has developed to its 

 present standing. 238 



The principal charities 239 are 

 CHARITIES those for education, 240 medical 241 and 

 religious purposes 242 ; but there are 

 in addition a considerable number of smaller benefac- 

 tions for the benefit of the poor by gifts of money, 

 food, clothing, apprentices' fees, and other ways. None 

 of them appear to be intended for the whole parish ; 

 some are restricted to the borough of Preston, and 

 others to particular townships or groups. 243 



Catherine Pennington in 1 87 1 left _£ 1,000 for the 

 benefit of poor women in the town and neighbour- 

 hood of Preston, to be distributed by the wardens of 

 Church of England parishes. The total income is 

 £29 2J. 5^., and it is distributed according to the 

 founder's wish. 244 Margaret Becconsall in 1872 left 

 money to the New Jerusalem Church, one-seventh 



being for poor members ot the congregation ; 

 £7 qj. 6d. is distributed accordingly among from five 

 to nine persons. William Edmundson in 1735 left 

 £50 to buy bread for the prisoners at Lancaster and 

 Preston ; half the income, £6 10s. %d., is given to 

 assist prisoners discharged from Preston Gaol, usually 

 by gifts of clothing or travelling expenses. Mary 

 Cross in 1889 gave £600, now producing £ij 14/. 

 a year, for the poor of the borough ; the income is 

 distributed in small money doles. The benefits of 

 the Harris Orphanage in Fulwood are available for 

 children whose parents reside within eight miles of 

 Preston Town Hall. This includes the whole parish 

 of Preston and large parts of the adjacent parishes. 248 

 For the township of Preston several apprenticing 

 charities have been absorbed into the grammar school 

 endowments, 246 but the combined gifts of Dorothy 

 Cosney (1678) 247 and John Dawson (1698) are now 

 applicable in part for apprenticing and in part for 

 medical relief, nursing, &c. 248 Some gifts, amounting 

 to £14 14.S. \d., have been combined with the 

 mayor's dole. 249 The almshouses have been pulled 

 down, 250 the bread money has ceased, 251 and some 



years ; Duchy of Lane. Rentals, bdle. 5, 

 no. 1 5 . Nicholas Banaster was the 

 incumbent in 1535 ; Valor Eccl. v, 263. 

 The revenue was 61s. 



233 The chantry lands were in 1556 

 granted by Mary to the Savoy Hospital, 

 which she revived ; Anderton D. (Mr. 

 Stonor). 



236 In a disturbance at St. Mary Mag- 

 dalene's Chapel in May 1358 John the 

 Clerk of Broughton, master of the schools 

 of Preston, was among those incriminated j 

 Assize R. 439, m. 2. 



Raines {Chantries, 206) quotes from 

 the registers of the Archdeacon of Rich- 

 mond the appointment of Richard Mar- 

 shall in 1399 to the grammar schools at 

 Preston. Marshall was enrolled as a 

 burgess in 1415 ; Preston Guild R. 9. 



237 The story is given in Fishwick's 

 Preston, 204-12. 



Peter Carter, the schoolmaster who 

 died in 1590, was author of Annotations 

 on Seton's Logic ; see Diet, Nat. Biog. 



238 See article on 'Schools,' V.C.H. 

 Lanes, ii, 569, and End. Char. Rep. Pres- 

 ton, 1905. 



239 An official inquiry was made in 

 Oct. 1904, and the report, published in 

 1905, includes a reprint of that of 1824. 

 Some earlier charities are recorded by 

 Bishop Gastrell, Notitia^ 11^.4.65. 



240 The Grammar School, Blue School, 

 and Harris Institute and Free Library 

 are the principal of these. 



241 The Royal Infirmary has an endow- 

 ment of ^2,148 a year j the Industrial 

 Institute for the Blind has about £300. 

 Mary Cross's gift for poor deaf and dumb 

 children, founded in 1899, produces an 

 income of ^31. 



242 The Blue School, founded by Roger 

 Sudell in 1702 in a cottage in Minspit 

 Weind, off Fishergate, is now absorbed 

 in the schools attached to the parish 

 church. The founder desired the vicar 

 'to appoint a sober and religious person 

 for a catechist, of the communion of the 

 Church of England, to catechize and 

 teach in the said school the poorest chil- 

 dren of Preston and of the parish of 

 Preston, gratis, the true fear and worship 

 of God, and to teach them to read Eng- 

 lish, that they might be better enabled to 

 attain to holiness ' 



Maria Holland in 1873—7 gave a capi- 

 tal fund of nearly ^20,000 to found St. 

 Joseph's Orphanage for destitute female 

 children and for other charitable pur- 

 poses, of which ^1,106 was devoted to 

 an institution for the sick poor, providing 

 an endowment of £38 13J. 4J. 



There are various smaller endowments 

 for religious purposes. 



243 The details here given are taken 

 from the report of 1905. 



244 A smaller gift of the same kind 

 was made by William Cooton in 1876, 

 by which £40 came to the poor of St. 

 Saviour's, Preston. The interest (28s.) 

 is distributed by the vicar in small doles 

 of money and provisions. 



345 End. Char. Rep. Lane. 1902. 



246 George Rogerson in 161 9 charged 

 his lands in Broughton with ^13 a year, 

 payable £9 to the mayor of Preston for 

 apprenticing and £4. to the mayor of Lan- 

 caster for the prisoners there. Henry 

 Banister in 1625 left sums including .£200 

 towards the apprenticing of poor children 

 of Preston ; this is now represented by the 

 moiety of a rent-charge of £ 16. Thomas 

 Winckley in iyio\cft £$Q for appren- 

 ticing. Henry Rishton and Eleanor his 

 wife in 1738 gave £300 for the poor, of 

 which half the interest was for appren- 

 ticing poor children. These sums with 

 various accumulations are intact ; but, as 

 applications for apprentice fees ceased, no 

 grants having been made since 1855, the 

 gross income (about £$$) ls applied to 

 scholarships at the grammar school. 



347 Her main gift was ,£100 for 

 ' twelve pious men or widows,' but she 

 added £6, the interest whereof was to be 

 spent in entertaining the trustees at the 

 'Hind' or elsewhere. The Hind Inn 

 is mentioned by John Taylor the ' Water 

 Poet' in 1618. 



248 His gift was ;£ioo for the poor and 

 for apprenticing in alternate years. 



The combined charity, represented by 

 a rent-charge of £10 10s. on the 'Three 

 Legs of Man ' in Preston, with accumula- 

 tions of ^289, is administered under a 

 scheme of the Charity Commissioners 

 made in 1904. The gross income is 

 £18 125. 4<A, of which £8 is for 

 nursing, subscriptions to dispensaries, 

 supply of clothes, &c, and the residue 



89 



primarily for apprenticing, and then 

 (should there be any balance) for outfit on 

 entering a trade, or on passage money or 

 outfit of emigrants. 



249 Henrietta Rigby in 1741 left ,£ioo 

 to the vicar and the mayor for the benefit 

 of six poor widows, housekeepers in 

 Preston. The capital is held by the 

 corporation ; £2 a year is distributed by 

 the mayor to three poor widows, and £2 

 likewise by the vicar. 



William Rishton in 1729 left £100 to 

 the mayor and aldermen, the interest to 

 be given to the poor at Christmas. This 

 is preserved, the mayor distributing £4. 

 in doles of 15. each. 



Thomas Hogkinson in 1697 be- 

 queathed £$0 for the poor, and in respect 

 of it £2 is distributed by the mayor at 

 Christmas in doles of is. to 2s. 6d. 



Elizabeth Parker in 1757, acting 

 according to the desire of her father 

 Joseph Chorley, gave a rent-charge of ,£4 

 on land at Ciaughton (as the interest of 

 £100), half to go to the poor of Preston. 

 This £2 is now distributed by the mayor 

 in gifts of 2s. 6d. each. 



A moiety of the gift of Henry and 

 Eleanor Rishton, already named, has 

 recently been administered by the mayor ; 

 but this appears to be an irregularity. 

 The amount is £4. 141. 4-d. 



250 Bartholomew Worthington, a bene- 

 factor of the grammar school, in 1663 

 directed his wife to build a small alms- 

 house on the waste near Fishergate bars. 

 It was built, but there was no endowment, 

 and, on its falling into decay, the materials 

 were sold, and the money, with an 

 addition, applied to build an almshouse 

 at .the east end of the town. Here there 

 had been a range of almshouses, of un- 

 known origin, managed by the corpora- 

 tion, which in 1790 were replaced by six 

 houses, Worthington's being a seventh. 

 The corporation nominated the inmates. 

 There were three other almshouses occu- 

 pied by poor persons put in by the mayor. 

 The almshouses were sold in 1835, the 

 corporation being under no known obli- 

 gation to maintain them, 



251 It was a sum of 301. a year paid 

 out of the Blue Coat charity fund for 

 bread for the poor on Sacrament days 

 It ceased about 1812. 



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