A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Campion's fate does not concern us, save that we are told the names of 

 the people who entertained him in Lancashire.'*' 



Up to this date the Lancashire Roman Catholics had suffered no great 

 hardships as a body. The fines of the recusants in the county had been 

 granted to a courtier, Nicholas Anesley, and the Catholics had been so em- 

 boldened as to refuse to pay him their fines or even to make a moderate 

 composition with him, and the administration had looked on for a time 

 almost supinely."* But the new political danger brooked no such leniency. 

 Acting on information sent on i6 May, 1580, by Sir Edmund Trafford to 

 the earl of Leicester as to the contemptuous and disobedient attitude of the 

 Catholics in the county,'" the queen issued a new Ecclesiastical Commission 

 :n June to the archbishop of York, the earl of Derby, the bishop of Chester 

 and others for the diocese of Chester to proceed against certain gentlemen and 

 others in Lancashire lately fallen away in religion, and for the rest of the year 

 the commission was active, the earl of Derby even lending his house in 

 Liverpool as a prison for the recusants. But the existing mechanism of the 

 law was not strong enough to cope with the growing danger.'" Accordingly 

 an Act was passed ' to retain the Queen's subjects in their due allegiance,'"'' 

 Besides strengthening the provisions of the Act of 1571 against bulls from 

 Rome, this Act imposed the celebrated recusancy fine of jCzo per month on 

 persons neglecting to attend church, and empowered justices of the peace to 

 inquire of offences herein. On 10 December, 1581, the Privy Council 

 issued its mandate to the sheriffs and justices of peace of Lancashire to put 

 the Act m execution, nothing having been done therein as yet, although six 

 months before (28 May, 1581) a similar order had been sent by the Privy 

 Council to Bishop Chaderton."' The local procedure under the Act was that 

 the clergy were to present an oath to the custos rotulorum and the justices at 

 the succeeding quarter sessions, and upon conviction the fines were imposed. 

 The effect of the Act was instantaneous and extraordinary. Previously, up to 

 as late as 6 December, 158 i, the convicted recusants in the county were so few 

 in number that two or three small prisons (Chester, Halton, Manchester, and 

 Liverpool) sufficed for their detention.'" The fines hitherto imposed also 

 were so insignificant as a source of revenue that they were entered miscel- 

 aneously in the Great Roll or were granted out to favourites. But hence, 

 orth they became so numerous and valuable that a separate roll was made of 

 them. From the testimony of these Recusancy Rolls we can judge with 

 absolute certainty o the success of the seminary priests from 1574 onwards, 

 r.n. IaTTI '^.' ^^^''^^ Ecclesiastical Commission was a subject for 

 the s m/ r ' . '^If"^^ ^°^"'^^' ^^^^°"g^ ^^^^ body did not 'omit at 



work '^ T^ ^^^^ ^ '' '^^ ^^"'^^""^^ °^ ^°"^^ °^ ^^^ j^^tices in the 

 work. For greater safety such of the recusants as had been actually 

 imprisoned were removed from Liverpool to Manchester.- There thev 

 were placed under the guard of Mr. Robert Worsley, and when he pedtioned 



They'et^t'Ta'u.ot, Thomf 's<lu\twL\ty ^.'f ' """t P^C- '' '°« ' ^^^P^' ^^^"''^ » (^). 359- 

 Park,J,Ve3tby, and Rigmaiden ^"^^^°"^' Bartholomew Heskett, Mrs. Allen, Richard Hoghton of the 



" iT£: W.'c/.'f 'g-i"'- "^ S.P. Dom. Eliz. vol. .38, No. ,8. 



' ' Peck, Desid. Cur. i, 10', ', , j . j,,, „f,i,pn - o . " ^^ Eliz. cap. i. 



56 



