ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



The commissioners for this wapentake made two recommendations as to 

 the amalgamation of livings, namely that Skegby should be united to Sutton 

 in Ashfield, and that Papplewick should be united to Linby, 



With the restoration of the monarchy came the revival of episcopacy. 

 A generous period of grace was allowed up to 24 August 1662 for the 

 withdrawal of those Presbyterian or Independent incumbents who could not 

 conscientiously accept ordination and the use of the Book of Common 

 Prayer. According to Calamy's list the following incumbents were on that 

 date ejected, namely the vicars of Arnold, Beeston, Bleasby, Blidworth, 

 Calverton, Flintham, Greasley, Kirton, Kneesall, Mattersey, Nottingham 

 (St. Mary and St. Peter), RoUeston, Southwell, Sutton in Ashfield, and 

 Thrumpton ; and the rectors of West Bridgeford, Clayworth, CoUingham, 

 Cotgrave, Cromwell, Eakring, and Linby. But out of this total of twenty- 

 three, ten afterwards conformed.^*** 



Of the ejected ministers of this county, the only one of any eminence 

 was Joseph Truman. He was born at Gedling in 1631. He graduated at 

 Clare College, Cambridge, B.A. in 1650, and M.A. 1654. He was placed 

 by the Presbyterians in the rectory of Cromwell in 1657. -^^ ^^^ Restora- 

 tion he declined to use the Book of Common Prayer, because, as Calamy 

 reports, ' there were lies in it.' After ejection he resided in Mansfield, and is 

 said to have always attended the services of the Established Church. In 

 1669 he published a theological work of close and subtle reasoning entitled 

 ' The Great Propitiation,' and was afterwards engaged in considerable literary 

 controversy with Bishop Bull. He died in 1671.^^' 



It is a common mistake to suppose that the Commonwealth period was 

 a time of general toleration of religious beliefs. The Presbyterians and 

 Independents, as well as the much smaller body of the Baptists, concluded a 

 truce ; but for Anglicans, Romanists, Quakers, and Unitarians, there was little 

 but persecution. The Quakers as a rule suffered the most severely, though 

 it must in common fairness be admitted that their continuous interruption 

 of the worship of others was most provocative, and that their objection to the 

 payment of tithes naturally brought them into collision with the authorities. The 

 Quakers, in direct contradiction to their eventual development, were by far the 

 noisiest and most aggressive of the sectaries during the earlier period of their 

 history. George Fox, their founder, born at Fenny Drayton, Leicestershire, in 

 1624, was apprenticed to a shoemaker at Nottingham.^^" His first imprison- 

 ment occurred in that town in 1649.^'' Besse, the 18th-century historian of 

 the Quakers, acknowledges that this imprisonment was caused by 'his opposition 

 to one of the public preachers.' After a eulogy as to the holy zeal and 

 fervency of his preaching, he naively adds, ' Nevertheless, some took offence 

 at his appearing in their place of worship, and the officers of the parish took 

 him away, and put him into a nasty stinking prison.' ^'^ His earliest recorded 

 convert at Nottingham was a widow named Elizabeth Hooton, who became 

 the first woman preacher of the society. After serving his term of imprison- 



' ^'^ Cs-hmy, Noncon/ormisi'f Memorial (ed. 1775), 11,275-300. 



"^ Diet. Nai. Biog. Sec. i^" Ibid. sul> voce. 



'" His imprisonment at Derby, where the nickname of Quaker had its origin, occurred in 1650 ; V.C.H. 

 Deri, ii, 29. 



"' Besse, Silverings 0/ tie Quakers (1753), i, 55 1-2. Chapter xvi of vol. i is entirely concerned with 

 Nottinghamshire. 



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