The Forest of Dean: An Historical and Descriptive Account. H. G. Nicholls
the free miners, and affording them support when injured at their work.
To these ends a payment of 6d. per quarter was levied upon each miner, digging for or carrying mineral, if fifteen years of age, as also upon every horse so used, payable within fourteen days, under a fine of 2s. Six collectors were to receive the above payments, to be remunerated at the rate of 1s. per quarter for each pound they gathered. Twice a year they handed in their accounts, under a penalty of £5, and perpetual exclusion from any office of trust, if such were found defective. It appears therefore that the free miners valued their rights, and not only took thought for the morrow, but provided for it. They added a proviso that the servants of the Deputy Constable should have the benefit of always being supplied first at the pits, showing that they knew something also of public diplomacy. This “Order” has the names of forty-eight miners attached, all severally sealed, but written in one hand.
In this year also (1674) it was suggested that if the King would put the old iron-works of the Forest in repair, and also build one furnace and two forges, all which might be done for £1,000, a clear profit of £2,190 could be made upon every 8,000 long and short cords of wood, of which the Forest was in a condition to supply a vast quantity. This proposal was nevertheless not acted upon, it being judged desirable rather to pull down the old iron-works than erect new, lest the waste in supplying the necessary quantities of wood should ultimately prove destructive to the Forest, now in a flourishing condition. Accordingly the iron-works then standing were ordered to be pulled down, and the materials sold. The greatest attention is admitted by the commissioners of 1788, who examined the office papers relating to this period, to have been given by the then Ministers of State, by Sir Charles Harbord, surveyor-general of the Crown lands, and by his son and successor Mr. William Harbord, to the protection of the young wood and the enclosures; and they affirm that “it is chiefly in those parts of the Forest which were then enclosed that the timber with which the dockyards have been since furnished from this Forest has been felled, and in which any considerable quantity of useful timber may now be found.”
On the 28th of September, 1675, at the recommendation of Sir Charles Harbord, to whom the plan was probably suggested by the precedent of the ten bailiwicks into which the district had been anciently divided, the Forest was formed into six “walks,” or districts, a keeper being appointed to each. Six lodges were built for their use in convenient situations, with 30 acres of land attached, “for the better encouragement and enabling of the said keepers to attend and watch over the said enclosures within their several walks, and to preserve the same, and the young springs of wood and trees thereon growing, and to grow from time to time, from spoil and harm.” The names given to each of the six divisions were derived from some of the most eminent living characters of that day. Thus, the Speech House, or King’s Walk, was so called after Charles II.; York Walk and Lodge after the Duke of York; Danby Walk and Lodge after the Earl of Danby, prime Minister at the time; Worcester Walk and Lodge after Henry Marquis of Worcester, the then constable of the Castle of St. Briavel’s, and warden of the Forest; Latimer Walk and Lodge after Viscount Latimer; and Herbert Walk and Lodge after Lord Herbert; in the two last instances, out of compliment to the Worcester family apparently. The Speech House was so called from its being intended for the use of the ancient Court of “the Speech,” as mentioned in the Laws and Franchises of the Mine. Now also a grant of sixty tons of timber was made by the King towards rebuilding the parish church of Newent, as a tablet therein declares.
How strictly the enclosures were preserved at this time against all mining operations, is shown by the refusal which Sir Charles Harbord gave to a petition presented to the Treasury by several gentlemen and freeholders of the parish of Newland, for leave to make a coal level through an enclosure, although they were backed by Sir Baynham Throckmorton, Deputy-Governor of St. Briavel’s Castle, who had also been one of the Commissioners first appointed for carrying out the Act of 1668, and who gave it as his opinion that agreeing to the prayer of the petition would conduce to the preservation of the woods in the Forest, and the convenience and advantage of the country. The wording of the refusal was very peremptory, to the effect that “the enclosures could only be preserved for timber by being kept discharged from all claims;” that “although miners and quarrymen had been long permitted to dig where they pleased, yet that they could not prove their right to do so; and as to coal-works, any such claims were unknown, much less any liberty of cutting his Majesty’s woods for the support thereof; and the same ought to be totally suppressed, and would be so by a good officer, as Colonel Wade was in the time of the Usurpation, and that only by the Forest Law, and the ordinary authority of a Justice of Peace.” It is not unlikely that in the last observation a hint was intended to be given to Sir Baynham Throckmorton, lest he should compromise his independent position with the colliers in the Forest by publicly accepting, as he had done the year before at their Mine Law Court, “their thankfull acknowledgment of the many favors received by them from him,” in return for which they agreed that, when he “should send his own horses or waynes to any of the colepitts for cole, the miners shall presently seame and load them before any other person whatever.”
Passing over an interval of three years, we come to the date of the third of the Mine Law Courts, held on the 8th September, 1678, at “Clowerwall,” before Sir Baynham Throckmorton, &c., whose favour it shows the free-miners were most anxious to preserve, since, upon understanding that the former order of 1668, forbidding any foreigner to convey or deliver minerals, had proved prejudicial to him and his friends and tenants, they now revoked the same, allowing any foreigner to carry fire or lime coal for his own use; besides which, they constituted the Marquis of Worcester, the then Constable of St. Briavel’s Castle, as well as Sir Baynham Throckmorton, his Deputy, “free miners to all intents and purposes.”
This same Court decided that “the Winchester bushell, three of which were to make a barrell,” should be the constant measure for “iron ore and coale,” 4d. being the smallest price allowed to be taken for “a barrell of fire coale.” Pits having become numerous, they decreed that “none should presume to sink a pit within 100 yards of one already made without the consent of the undertakers, under a penalty of 100 dozen of good fire coale” (which is the earliest regulation for protecting coal-works). Lastly, six “barganers” were to fix the price at which iron ore should be sold or carried to the different works. The names of forty-eight miners are appended to this “order,” all written in the same hand opposite their respective marks.
The importance of securing a supply of timber for the navy led to frequent Commissions of Inquiry, and the issue of Instructions, with respect to the royal forests. The Marquis of Worcester, Warden of Dean Forest, made a Return, on the 23rd of April, 1680, minutely describing the condition of the older trees, as well as of those planted ten years before, together with the state of the fences surrounding the new plantations. Parts of several of the enclosures are reported to have trees which were grown up out of the reach of cattle, and therefore fit to be thrown open, an equal quantity of waste land being enclosed instead, which was accordingly done by warrant, dated 21st July, 1680, not more than eleven years from the time they were taken in: consequently the young trees must have grown with rapidity, or else were left to take their chance very early. With the design as it would seem of making room for the new plantations, it is further stated that “there were remaining about 30 cabins, in several parts of the Forest, inhabited by about 100 poor people, and that they had taken care to demolish the said cabins, and the enclosures about them.” It should be remarked that these poor people must not be classed with the “free miners” of the Forest, although “they had been born in it, and never lived elsewhere,” but as “cabiners,” who had to work seven years in the pits before they could become “free.”
The fourth Record of the Mine Law Court informs us that it sat before Sir Baynham Throckmorton on the 27th April, 1680, at the Speech House, yet barely completed, unless it were the spacious Court-room, devoted to the public business of the Forest, for which it has been used ever since. The “Order” then passed implies, that although the last Court had appointed six “bargainers” to deal with the difficult question of valuing the minerals offered for sale, inconvenience was yet experienced on this head.
It was therefore decreed