A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



of Spcke to celebrate for the souls of himself and 

 his ancestors.* 



The church, according to an old rhyme, was 

 famous for * ringing and singing.** 



As to the charities of the parish, 

 CHARITIES Bishop Gastrell was in 1718 able to 

 report little in addition to the schools 

 at Much Woolton and Hale.' The commissioners of 

 1828 gave a much longer list,* but even in 1903 the 

 amount for the parish as a whole was very small ; ^ 

 Hale * and Halewood ^ had some considerable bequests, 

 but the charity founded recently by Mrs. Mary Jane 

 Cross for the relief of poor residents of Much and 

 Little Woolton suffering from accidents and non- 

 infectious diseases is the most important from its 

 amount.® The other townships have little or no 

 funds of the kind.' 



CHILDWALL 



Cildeuuelle,Dm.Bk.; Childwall,i 261 ; Childewclle. 

 1291 ; Childewalle, 1212, 1332 ; Childewall, 1354 

 and onwards (common form) ; also Chaldcwall, 1238; 

 Chaldewal, i 305. The terminations * wall ' and *wcll ' 

 appear indiiFerently. Childow is the local pronuncia- 

 tion. 



The township of Childwall, containing 83 I acres, "^ is 

 principallysituatedon the slope of a low hill, the highest 

 point of which is 223 ft. above sea-level, commanding 

 an extensive panorama of a wide, flat plain lying to 

 the east. The district has an agreeable park-like 

 appearance, with plantations and pastures, diversified 

 with cultivated fields, where crops of corn, turnips, 

 and potatoes are raised. There are but few dwellings, 

 besides the hall and the houses which cluster about 

 the church. The geological formation consists of the 

 bunter series of the new red sandstone or trias ; 



^ By charters dated 16 Dec. 1484., 

 Thomas Norris of Speke and John his 

 brother gave to Richard Norris and others 

 lands in Halewood, Much Woolton, and 

 Garston ; the income arising therefrom to 

 be paid yearly to Humphrey Norris, clerk, 

 to celebrate in the chapel of St. Thomas 

 the Martyr of Childwall, and after his 

 death to the chaplain nominated by 

 Thomas Norris or his heirs for ever. The 

 chapel itself was therefore more ancient 

 than the Norris chantry. In Nov. 1532, 

 Thomas Plombc, then the chaplain, re- 

 quested the surviving trustees to make a 

 new feoffment, and they accordingly did 

 80 J Norris D. (B. M.), n. 219, 223. 



*John the chaplain* seems to have 

 been cantarist in 1+99 j ibid. n. 29. John 

 Day was priest in 1494. 



Canon Raines gives the names of three 

 others : — Hulme, Henry Hill (instituted 

 on 2 May, 1504), and the above-named 

 Thomas Plombe, who was in charge at 

 the suppression, being then sixty years of 

 age. He had a pension of j^3 6j. in 

 1551, which was about the rental (671. ^d,) 

 as returned by the commissioners. This 

 income had been derived from houses and 

 lands in Great Woolton (26:. %d.\ Gar- 

 ston (i6j.), H.ilewood (22J, 7^/.), and 

 Wavertrec (21.). There was no pi.iti-, the 

 priest celebrating with the ornaments of 

 the parish church. See Raines, Chantries 

 (Chet. Soc), 98. 



A lease of the chantry lands for twenty 

 years was made to Edward Norris in 

 1582; he paiJ £11 and was to render 

 annually £}, ~s. ^d. to the crown ; and in 

 1608 Sir WiUiam Norris secured a grant 

 of them made by the king two years be- 

 fore, the same annual rent to be paid ; 

 Pat.+Jas. I, pt. xxiii j Norris D. (B.M.). 



The inscriptions on the chantry win- 

 dows are recorded in the Norris Deeds; 

 the account by Ormerod (in the Parcn- 

 talia) is imperfect. Three others asked 

 pravers for Edmund Crosse and his family; 

 i^or Thomas Norris of Speke and John his 

 brother, and also for * Sir John Lathom, 

 formerly lord of Aldford,' who built and 

 founded the chantry ; and for William 

 Norris, vicar of some church unnamed, 

 who died 18 Aug. 1460, and Richard his 

 brother. There is an error in the above. 

 Sir John Stanley was lord of Aldford 2 to 

 16 Edw. IV; John Lathom was rector 

 there 1461-84; Ormerod, Cbes. (ed. 

 Helsby), ii, 75"> 759- 



9 Pal, Note B^jk, ii, 279. 



* Notitia CestT. ii, 168, 171. 



^ The following notes are from the 

 reports of the Char. Com. of 1828 (xx. 

 83, &c.) and the End. Char. Report for 

 Childwall issued in 1904. This latter 

 concerns only that portion of the parish 

 outside Liverpool in 1903. 



* The total sum available in 1903 

 was ^^504 a year, but more than half of 

 this was the endowment of Gateacre 

 chapel, and ;^I48 of the remainder was 

 Mrs. Cross's newly-founded charity. 



Henry Watmough by will in 1 "46 

 left a rent-charge of ,^2 lOj. on a field in 

 Doe Park for a distribution of bread every 

 Sunday to the poor of the parish. This 

 was in force until 1869, when the land 

 was sold. The purchaser refused to pay, 

 on the ground that the rent-charge was 

 void under the Mortmain Act. It is not 

 known whether the vendors were called 

 upon to provide for the continuance of 

 the benefaction. Edward Almond of 

 Much Woolton about 1836 left a similar 

 charge, void in law, for the same purpose. 

 The devisee of the field paid the charge 

 voluntarily, but his executors refused to 

 continue. These charities are therefore 

 extinct. A sum of ^20 having been paid 

 to Rector Campbell in 1848 — supposed to 

 represent moneys given early in the eigh- 

 teenth century — he purchased with it and 

 other money partly contributed by him- 

 self £1 20 railway stock, now yielding 

 £^ i6j. zd. yearly ; this is divided accord- 

 ing to his instructions, the chief part going 

 to the poor. 



« William Part of Hale by will in 

 1753 left j^ioo to found a bread charity 

 at Hale chapel, and another ^^loo for 

 money or clothes for poor housekeepers 

 and widows. Ellen Halsall by her will 

 of 1734 left a rent-charge of zoi. on a 

 house in Tithebarn Street, Liverpool, to 

 provide *the most easy, choice, valuable, 

 authentic, approved, and elaborate trea- 

 tises' on arithmetic and mathematics to 

 be given to boys. These charities are 

 intact, but the bread distribution has been 

 discontinued and the money is otherwise 

 employed, under the authority of the 

 Charity Commissioners. The house in 

 Tithebarn Street having been pulled down 

 for town improvements, the 20j. from it is 

 paid by the corporation of Liverpool, 

 though books have not been provided out 

 of it. Mary Leigh by will in 1856 

 (proved 1872) left jf 700 for the repairs 

 of a certain tomb, and then for a distri- 

 bution to the poor on the anniversary of 

 her death. In 1828 there was an old 



108 



poor's stock of ;^i3, an annual charge 

 of 13J. being paid from the rates on 

 account of it. This has long been dis- 

 continued. 



' Though some benefactions had been 

 lost to Halewood by 1828 three old dona- 

 tions were and are still existing — a rent- 

 charge of 20J. on John Lyon's estate in 

 Upton, another rent-charge of 50J. on 

 Peacock's farm In Halewood, founded by 

 Jane Hey or William Carter, and loj. 

 mterest on ^20 bequeathed in 1778 by 

 Thomas Tyldesley. The Rev. Thomas 

 Chambers, lately rector, left the residue 

 of his estate (^^850) for the maintenance 

 of the churchyard ; and Catherine Hen- 

 rietta Law French, widow, left ^£'500 for 

 the church bells and other money for the 

 school. 



8 The bequest was by her will of 1894, 

 proved in 1902. The net residuary estate 

 was j^4, 1 77. The trustees have decided 

 to purchase a house at Woolton for a 

 nurses' home, in connexion with the 

 Convalescent Institution, at a cost of 

 ^1,500. 



The Rev. Joseph Lawton, minister of 

 Gateacre Chapel, left in 1740 a rent- 

 charge of 20J. for a bread charity and 

 teaching poor children, 



* For the township of Childwall, Jane 

 Hey in 1722 bequeathed a rent of i6j. 

 charged on the New House in Halewood 

 — it is now known as Peacock's — to be 

 distributed to the poor on Good Friday. 

 In 1828 it was found to be the practice 

 to add it to the poor rate, but this was 

 corrected, and it is now given to the poor. 

 WiUiam Carter left sums of money for 

 the poor, which in 1730 amounted to 

 j^49 ; all had been lost before 1828. For 

 a long time down to 1864 a payment of 

 31. 4£/., of unknown origin, was made by 

 the owner of Abbey Heys in Little 

 Woolton and applied to parish purposes. 

 Nothing is now known of it. 



For Garston, sundry donations amount- 

 ing to £1^0 for the benefit of poor house- 

 keepers were in 1790 invested in a cottage 

 and garden, producing a rent of 50J. In 

 1820 two new cottages were built on the 

 old site, and out of the rent 50J. con- 

 tinued in 1828 to be given to the poor in 

 cloth, the remainder of the rent being 

 devoted to paying the coat and interest 

 incurred in building the cottages. 



For Wavertrec, Allerton, and Spcke no 

 special charities are recorded. 



^^ The census of 1901 gives 830 acres, 

 including 2 acres of inland water. 



