THE EARLY COMMERCE OF PLYMOUTH. 293 
while Millbrook, Hooe, and Yealm sent 5 ships, with 83 men. 
London sent 25 ships, and Bristol only 22. 
We also find, from the year 1289 downwards, a number of writs 
addressed by the Crown to the bailiffs and commonalty of Ply- 
mouth, in reference to maritime affairs, which continue at frequent 
intervals throughout the fourteenth century. The first of these 
writs was to direct the bailiffs to prepare a ship to transport men- 
at-arms and horses on service. They replied that they had pre- 
pared. the Michell, of Plymouth, and she is the first Plymouth 
vessel recorded in history. 
The well-known fact that Plymouth was the headquarters of the 
operations of the Black Prince against France is a military matter, 
and does not now concern us, beyond its testimony to the im- 
portance of a port in which over three hundred ships could be 
fitted out for an expedition. This indeed was the case here as 
early as 1287. It was whilst he was at Plymouth that the Black 
Prince was created the first Duke of Cornwall, and invested with 
those rights of fundus and foreshore which have so sorely vexed 
commercial enterprise in these latter days, and have given the 
Duchy of Cornwall an abiding interest in the commercial fortunes 
of our town. Plymouth, however, had been in some sense an 
appanage of the ancient Cornish earldom ; for there is a record that 
in 1334 Thomas de Spokenton took the water and port of Sutton, 
with all the customs and dues, except chattels forfeited at the suit 
of the lord, wreck of sea, prisage of wine, etc., of the honour and 
castle of Trematon, to be held in convention at the rent of 
£17 10s.; which may represent between £300 and £400 of our 
present money. 
In the opening years of this fourteenth century Plymouth had 
an. active trade with France. It was to Sutton that, in the years 
1317-18, the glass for glazing the Lady Chapel at Exeter Cathedral 
was brought from Rouen. Corn and wine were among the chief 
items of import, then as now. In 1360 royal permission was 
given to the merchants of Plymouth to trade with Portugal: and 
Richard I. granted a scale of customs to the “ mayor and bailiffs, 
honest men and commonalty,” for the purpose of fortifying the 
town, which enumerates among the articles of trade, wine, honey, 
mead, cloth, linen, canvas, skins, hake, pilchards, salt, coals, her- 
rings, iron, cheese, soap, wax, corn, boards, pitch and tar, slates, 
tiles, hemp, and cord ; besides dues on fishing boats of 12d. a year; 
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