Shuttington in 1650
This article was written by Alan Roberts of Adelaide, Australia as part of an academic study of this area.
A Survey of the Copyholders and Customs of Shuttington in 1650
Shuttington was a manor divided into two moieties which were re-united in 1159 when the manor was given to the priory of Alvecote. An Elizabethan survey from 1566 after the Dissolution, records 12 messuages or tenements and 5 cottages, with dovecotes and a water mill. Another very detailed survey of the manor in 1629 when it came into the possession of Queen Henrietta Marie provides a full list of the tenants and many of the field names. By this time it apparently covered 600 acres and was valued at £210.13s (VCH Warws, iv, 213), a ripe plum for the trustees and contractors appointed by the Rump Parliament to raise money to pay off the parliamentary army.
The survey drawn up for the sale of the possessions of the late king Charles Stewart and Queen Henrietta Maria his wife in 1650 was probably based on the earlier Elizabethan survey. It gives us a fascinating glimpse of Shuttington in the mid-seventeenth century including a description of the manor house on the site of the old Alevecote priory - nine ground floor rooms and six above - and a detailed description of the attached enclosures, meadowlands and field strips. William Combey, representing himself “and several other original creditors”, found himself the new owner of this Capitall messuage or house plot with Dovehouse close to the east, and pasture lands, closes and coppices stretching down to the river and as far as Alvecote woods, including all the “game, profits and benefits” that once belonged to the dissolved cell of the priory of Alvecote.
The 1650 survey also describes the manor of Shuttington with a brief list of some of the copyholders and their holdings and a summary of the "customs of the manor". It starts with a small tenement or messuage belonging to the widow Margaret Sheamons, abutting the main street to the east, with three acres of land belonging to John Farmer on the west. Margaret also leased an acre of arable land called Five Butts in one of the common fields called the Middle Field, between lands belonging to Michael Bayley on the north and Gostell Hedge.
Robert Ensor, the second copyhold tenant listed, occupied a cottage covering about an acre and two roods, "now or late" between Murcott Heath on the west and a parcel of ground belonging to Jeffery Hunt on the east. Robert also had a meadow close of around two acres in extent called Maxmore Meadow, between Pooley Heath and Hillfield Meadow. Many of these field names may still survive in the modern landscape and some of the tenants' names re-appear in later records. A Henry Ensor, almost certainly related appears later in the Hearth Tax returns as a householder with two hearths. Next to Robert, between his cottage and that of Beardsley Inns to the west, was a cottage belonging to Jeffrey Hunt with a single rood "more or less" and nearby to the east of the street, an old tenement or cottage on two roods occupied by Amy Seale, a widow. The adjoining copyholder, Francis Allen had a "parcel of pasture ground" called Peartree Piece, covering eleven poles. Again, the continuity of the copyhold seems to have been preserved, the 1670 hearth tax return listing a Samuel Allin liable for a tenement with three hearths.
We learn that that these four copyholders held their tenements, messuages, cottages, crofts, yards, mills, houses, dovehouses, yards, gardens backsides, stables, edifices, ways, passages and easements &c by customary tenure regulated by the manorial Court Leet and Court Baron. These included customary services and franchises, including the payment of Herriott, the best beast or goods on entry into a lease, and the goods and chattels forfeited by felons, fugitives, "outlawed persons and clerks convicted". It covers every possible right or revenue source from the lands from water rights, royalties and juristictions over streams, dams and weirs, to charges for exigent waifs Estraye, an archaic legal reference to escaped bondsmen. The mill is not mentioned as it had already been farmed out and leased separately.
The transactions described in the survey clearly show attempts to raise money through the sale of manorial rights, copyhold rents and leases. An indenture from February 1638 granted to Sir John Fetherley of Canterbury records that he had let the manor in trust to Sir John Smith, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and his wife Dame Marbella, for a term of 60 years, allowance being made for copyhold rent after the extirpation of the leases. George Moreton Esq. and Albertus Moreton gent, sons of the late Richard Moreton of East Sture in Kent, were to pay £16.4d per annum “by small portions” at Lady Day and Michaelmas, allowing for the necessary “Bootes and Tymber” to repair the premises. The surveyors record that if the rent or any part be behind and left unpaid for forty days the lease is forfeited and double the rent becomes liable. In 1650 the surveyors certified that Lady Smith in London was by then aged about fifty, the widow Holland was thirty-four and Albertus, George Moreton’s widow in Ireland, was twenty eight, although “by what title the Lady Smith now enjoys the lease is not made to appear”.
The survey concludes with an account of the Customs of the Manor which probably went back to medieval times. The Borough of Tamworth still has court leet rolls dating back from 1288 to the time of Elizabeth I which describe the Portmanleet Court meeting every third Monday to supervise the Frankpledges and tithings, and the court leet which met less frequently, after Easter and Michaelmass. The Court Leet for Shuttington probably met no more than twice a year to adjudicate similar matters relating to the copyhold tenancies, its main function being to adjust matters between the lord and the tenants, to supervise entry fines for leases and to perambulate the parish boundaries. The 1650 survey records that the steward of Shuttington always granted the successors of the copyhold one, two or three lives by Copyhold of the Court Roll, “it being at the choice of the tenant whether he will take for one or more lives”. Once admitted at the open court the tenant could choose whether to renew the copyhold during his life or not. Wives, sons and assigns of every tenant once presented to the jury were accepted and admitted by the Steward. Although none of the successors were ever admitted without his consent when a tenant abandoned his tenement or died, it usually left for a “Dead Year” by custom before a new tenant was admitted. “If it fall out that the parties left in possession have not been admitted within the year, not by their own fault or wilful neglect, they cannot be disposed but must be found by the Jury and admitted as tenant”. These precautions protected the copyhold tenants so that continuity was ensured, “when the first life dies the second enters and then the third”.
The survey concludes with a contract for the sale of these customary lands and hereditary holdings granted by the survey taken on 23rd August, 1650, signed by Thomas Wheatley the Deputy Registrar, together with list of amounts owing to creditors. “The one full moiety to be paid within eight weeks now the other in 6 months after, the whole purchase to be paid in ready money or original debentures”. A lease was drawn up for the customary 99 years or three lives, by copy of Court Roll of commons, and the ground used for Common ways, waste ground with impropriated parsonages, presentations, Advowsons or rights of Patronage of vicarages. The contract was attested on 26th February, 1650 and signed by Richard Sydenham with others as witnesses, then authorized by the Trustees named by William Combey and his heirs, the new owner, and signed by the Deputy Registrar John Whratby on 10th March, 1650. Clearly, the ancient rights and customs of the copyholders of Shuttington were still being upheld in the mid-seventeenth century, having survived the upheavals of the Civil War into the time of the Commonwealth.
A final note can be added with mention of a domestic disturbance in Alvecote at the Michaelmas sessions of the Warwick Quarter Sessions court. Those charged include Thomas Leeving the younger, identified elsewhere as a gentleman and lord of the manor, his wife, Lettice and a party of Shuttington residents. These include mainly widows and spinsters, Susannah Grovenor, Mary Seale, Joan Ensor and Anne Pann, together with William Harbert (otherwise known as Tallis or Thompson), and William Sheapard, both husbandmen. These villagers were jointly charged with “assaulting and beating” Grace and Elizabeth Bach, a widow and a spinster, perhaps mother and daughter. Some of the names listed are familiar – as copyholders or landholders in the 1650 survey - others are listed in the Hearth Tax returns after 1662, among them Elizabeth Bach, one of two women who was riotously beaten. Unfortunately there is no explanation for the cause of the altercation in the sessions court records, however further delving into the records perhaps in the archdeaconry court which dealt with these sort of disturbances, may throw some light on the matter.
Notes and Sources
Victoria History of the County of Warwick, Vol. 4, ed. L.F. Salzman, Institute of Historical Research, London, 1947
P.R.O. (National Archives) State Papers Domestic: SP 121/5/1, 320/T4. 320/T10.
Tamworth Court Leet rolls are described in Henry Wood, Borough by Prescription: The history of the municipality of Tamworth, Tamworth Corporation, 1958, pp 44-45.
Warwick County Records. Quarter Sessions Order Book. Vol. III, p.99.
The Parliamenty survey for sale of Austrey fee farm rents in 1650 at http://www.austrey.co.uk/1650survey
© Alan Roberts, September, 2013
This article was written by Alan Roberts of Adelaide, Australia as part of an academic study of this area.
A Survey of the Copyholders and Customs of Shuttington in 1650
Shuttington was a manor divided into two moieties which were re-united in 1159 when the manor was given to the priory of Alvecote. An Elizabethan survey from 1566 after the Dissolution, records 12 messuages or tenements and 5 cottages, with dovecotes and a water mill. Another very detailed survey of the manor in 1629 when it came into the possession of Queen Henrietta Marie provides a full list of the tenants and many of the field names. By this time it apparently covered 600 acres and was valued at £210.13s (VCH Warws, iv, 213), a ripe plum for the trustees and contractors appointed by the Rump Parliament to raise money to pay off the parliamentary army.
The survey drawn up for the sale of the possessions of the late king Charles Stewart and Queen Henrietta Maria his wife in 1650 was probably based on the earlier Elizabethan survey. It gives us a fascinating glimpse of Shuttington in the mid-seventeenth century including a description of the manor house on the site of the old Alevecote priory - nine ground floor rooms and six above - and a detailed description of the attached enclosures, meadowlands and field strips. William Combey, representing himself “and several other original creditors”, found himself the new owner of this Capitall messuage or house plot with Dovehouse close to the east, and pasture lands, closes and coppices stretching down to the river and as far as Alvecote woods, including all the “game, profits and benefits” that once belonged to the dissolved cell of the priory of Alvecote.
The 1650 survey also describes the manor of Shuttington with a brief list of some of the copyholders and their holdings and a summary of the "customs of the manor". It starts with a small tenement or messuage belonging to the widow Margaret Sheamons, abutting the main street to the east, with three acres of land belonging to John Farmer on the west. Margaret also leased an acre of arable land called Five Butts in one of the common fields called the Middle Field, between lands belonging to Michael Bayley on the north and Gostell Hedge.
Robert Ensor, the second copyhold tenant listed, occupied a cottage covering about an acre and two roods, "now or late" between Murcott Heath on the west and a parcel of ground belonging to Jeffery Hunt on the east. Robert also had a meadow close of around two acres in extent called Maxmore Meadow, between Pooley Heath and Hillfield Meadow. Many of these field names may still survive in the modern landscape and some of the tenants' names re-appear in later records. A Henry Ensor, almost certainly related appears later in the Hearth Tax returns as a householder with two hearths. Next to Robert, between his cottage and that of Beardsley Inns to the west, was a cottage belonging to Jeffrey Hunt with a single rood "more or less" and nearby to the east of the street, an old tenement or cottage on two roods occupied by Amy Seale, a widow. The adjoining copyholder, Francis Allen had a "parcel of pasture ground" called Peartree Piece, covering eleven poles. Again, the continuity of the copyhold seems to have been preserved, the 1670 hearth tax return listing a Samuel Allin liable for a tenement with three hearths.
We learn that that these four copyholders held their tenements, messuages, cottages, crofts, yards, mills, houses, dovehouses, yards, gardens backsides, stables, edifices, ways, passages and easements &c by customary tenure regulated by the manorial Court Leet and Court Baron. These included customary services and franchises, including the payment of Herriott, the best beast or goods on entry into a lease, and the goods and chattels forfeited by felons, fugitives, "outlawed persons and clerks convicted". It covers every possible right or revenue source from the lands from water rights, royalties and juristictions over streams, dams and weirs, to charges for exigent waifs Estraye, an archaic legal reference to escaped bondsmen. The mill is not mentioned as it had already been farmed out and leased separately.
The transactions described in the survey clearly show attempts to raise money through the sale of manorial rights, copyhold rents and leases. An indenture from February 1638 granted to Sir John Fetherley of Canterbury records that he had let the manor in trust to Sir John Smith, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and his wife Dame Marbella, for a term of 60 years, allowance being made for copyhold rent after the extirpation of the leases. George Moreton Esq. and Albertus Moreton gent, sons of the late Richard Moreton of East Sture in Kent, were to pay £16.4d per annum “by small portions” at Lady Day and Michaelmas, allowing for the necessary “Bootes and Tymber” to repair the premises. The surveyors record that if the rent or any part be behind and left unpaid for forty days the lease is forfeited and double the rent becomes liable. In 1650 the surveyors certified that Lady Smith in London was by then aged about fifty, the widow Holland was thirty-four and Albertus, George Moreton’s widow in Ireland, was twenty eight, although “by what title the Lady Smith now enjoys the lease is not made to appear”.
The survey concludes with an account of the Customs of the Manor which probably went back to medieval times. The Borough of Tamworth still has court leet rolls dating back from 1288 to the time of Elizabeth I which describe the Portmanleet Court meeting every third Monday to supervise the Frankpledges and tithings, and the court leet which met less frequently, after Easter and Michaelmass. The Court Leet for Shuttington probably met no more than twice a year to adjudicate similar matters relating to the copyhold tenancies, its main function being to adjust matters between the lord and the tenants, to supervise entry fines for leases and to perambulate the parish boundaries. The 1650 survey records that the steward of Shuttington always granted the successors of the copyhold one, two or three lives by Copyhold of the Court Roll, “it being at the choice of the tenant whether he will take for one or more lives”. Once admitted at the open court the tenant could choose whether to renew the copyhold during his life or not. Wives, sons and assigns of every tenant once presented to the jury were accepted and admitted by the Steward. Although none of the successors were ever admitted without his consent when a tenant abandoned his tenement or died, it usually left for a “Dead Year” by custom before a new tenant was admitted. “If it fall out that the parties left in possession have not been admitted within the year, not by their own fault or wilful neglect, they cannot be disposed but must be found by the Jury and admitted as tenant”. These precautions protected the copyhold tenants so that continuity was ensured, “when the first life dies the second enters and then the third”.
The survey concludes with a contract for the sale of these customary lands and hereditary holdings granted by the survey taken on 23rd August, 1650, signed by Thomas Wheatley the Deputy Registrar, together with list of amounts owing to creditors. “The one full moiety to be paid within eight weeks now the other in 6 months after, the whole purchase to be paid in ready money or original debentures”. A lease was drawn up for the customary 99 years or three lives, by copy of Court Roll of commons, and the ground used for Common ways, waste ground with impropriated parsonages, presentations, Advowsons or rights of Patronage of vicarages. The contract was attested on 26th February, 1650 and signed by Richard Sydenham with others as witnesses, then authorized by the Trustees named by William Combey and his heirs, the new owner, and signed by the Deputy Registrar John Whratby on 10th March, 1650. Clearly, the ancient rights and customs of the copyholders of Shuttington were still being upheld in the mid-seventeenth century, having survived the upheavals of the Civil War into the time of the Commonwealth.
A final note can be added with mention of a domestic disturbance in Alvecote at the Michaelmas sessions of the Warwick Quarter Sessions court. Those charged include Thomas Leeving the younger, identified elsewhere as a gentleman and lord of the manor, his wife, Lettice and a party of Shuttington residents. These include mainly widows and spinsters, Susannah Grovenor, Mary Seale, Joan Ensor and Anne Pann, together with William Harbert (otherwise known as Tallis or Thompson), and William Sheapard, both husbandmen. These villagers were jointly charged with “assaulting and beating” Grace and Elizabeth Bach, a widow and a spinster, perhaps mother and daughter. Some of the names listed are familiar – as copyholders or landholders in the 1650 survey - others are listed in the Hearth Tax returns after 1662, among them Elizabeth Bach, one of two women who was riotously beaten. Unfortunately there is no explanation for the cause of the altercation in the sessions court records, however further delving into the records perhaps in the archdeaconry court which dealt with these sort of disturbances, may throw some light on the matter.
Notes and Sources
Victoria History of the County of Warwick, Vol. 4, ed. L.F. Salzman, Institute of Historical Research, London, 1947
P.R.O. (National Archives) State Papers Domestic: SP 121/5/1, 320/T4. 320/T10.
Tamworth Court Leet rolls are described in Henry Wood, Borough by Prescription: The history of the municipality of Tamworth, Tamworth Corporation, 1958, pp 44-45.
Warwick County Records. Quarter Sessions Order Book. Vol. III, p.99.
The Parliamenty survey for sale of Austrey fee farm rents in 1650 at http://www.austrey.co.uk/1650survey
© Alan Roberts, September, 2013