described in 1877 as having then been recently affixed to the church
chest.
Tideswell.—In 1845, Sir Stephen Glynne noted that “between the nave
and chancel is a good wood screen of Perpendicular character.” It was
“repaired” in 1882–3, the chisellings in the responds of the chancel
arch furnishing the outline of the original form of the vanished
upper portion. The lower part has been declared to be almost as
ancient as the church itself; but for the rest, it has been so much
altered and renovated that it is doubtful whether the gates or any
considerable portion of the upper half of the screen as now existing
is really authentic. The slender build of the screen has led to the
supposition that it cannot have been designed at the outset to carry
a rood-loft. That such, however, was added subsequently is clear from
the existence of the rood-stair, which, though since removed, was
standing in 1824. Its site was the western side of the north corner of
the chancel arch. It must have been a structure unusually conspicuous
compared with others built for the same purpose. It was of stone, and
occupied a space six feet square. The entrance was from the south, and
gave access to a small newel staircase, the doorway measuring about 4
ft. 2 in. in height by 22 inches in width. Some remains of it, lying
in the vicarage garden, were identified by the late Rev. Prebendary
Andrew, and described by him in the fifth volume of the _Journal of
the Derbyshire Archæological Society_ (published in 1883). What the
ancient rood-loft was like is not recorded. In the year 1724 a faculty
was obtained by one Samuel Eccles to take down an old loft (whether
the mediæval rood-loft or not it is impossible to tell) then existing
over the chancel, and to transfer it to the tower for the use and
advantage of the singers; and at the same time to erect a loft for
his own use over the entry into the chancel. The transported loft is
believed to have occupied its western position until about 1820, when
it was removed altogether, a new gallery being erected in its room.
Beside the rood-screen itself, wooden parcloses must have divided the
chantry chapels in the transepts from the nave and from the rest of the
church. At any rate a quantity of pieces of ancient wood-carving were
to be seen loose about the church in 1824, and “cart loads” of them are
said to have been removed in 1825 on the occasion of the re-pewing of
the building. A subsequent vicar, Rev. Prebendary Andrew (1864–1900),
set to work to restore as much as he could. Some pieces of woodwork he
rescued from various misuses within the church, others from private
possession in the parish. A length of carving that had been cut in two
and turned into bookstands, as well as two fragments of screenwork,
open tracery of great delicacy and beauty, he set up in the Lady
Chapel; while a third piece of tracery-work he placed in the middle
compartment of the communion table. “The parclose of the De Bower
chapel has recently”—it was written in 1877—“been restored in exactly
the same position that it previously occupied.”
Weston-on-Trent.—Rev. Dr. Cox in 1879 remarked on “the north aisle
being screened off by a parclose from the rest of the church.” The
length of the ancient rood-loft must have been the same as the width of
the nave, 18 ft. 5 in.
Wilne.—The rood-screen which occupies the chancel arch is of simple
Perpendicular workmanship. It is 18 ft. 4 in. long by 7 ft. 9 in. high.
There are ten bays, five on either side, arched. The lintel is plain,
without any kind of ornamentation applied, and there are no gates. A
small stone staircase, now walled up, to southwards of the chancel
arch, commemorates the entrance into the ancient rood-loft.
Youlgreave.—The churchwardens’ accounts, though not dating back earlier
than the beginning of the sixteenth century, contain some interesting
particulars about the rood-screen. In 1604, “the chancel gates were
boarded over,” and later in the same year occurs an item “for making
the partition betwixt the church and the chancell.” In 1661, a small
sum was paid “for 3 hinges for ye chancell gates,” which is evidence
that the rood-screen, howsoever sadly disfigured, with its doors, was
yet in existence at the above date. “There is now”—it was written in
1877—“no screen across the chancel arch, though it is in contemplation
to replace one, modelled on the mutilated remains of the lower part of
the old one, of Perpendicular design, which were removed at the time of
the ‘restoration’ (of 1869–73, by Mr. R. Norman Shaw), but have been
carefully preserved.” At about the end of the eighteenth century, the
fine old parclose erected round the eastern part of the south aisle was
removed.
Finally, I desire, as in duty bound, to acknowledge my obligations to
the Rev. Dr. Cox, whose monumental work on _The Churches of Derbyshire_
has been of inestimable service to me; to various writers, from whom I
have borrowed, in _The Reliquary_ and in the _Journal of the Derbyshire
Archæological Society_; to Rev. W. W. M. Kennedy for important
particulars concerning diocesan visitations; to Arthur Cox, Esq., of
Spondon Hall, for valuable introductions; and, lastly, to all those
clergy who have kindly allowed me to take photographs and measurements
in the churches committed to their charge.
PLANS OF THE PEAK FOREST
By Rev. J. Charles Cox, LL.D., F.S.A.
Derbyshire is fortunate in possessing a considerable number of plans
of the great tract of the Forest of the Peak, one of which is of late
Elizabethan date, and most of the remainder of the days of Charles I.
They are in safe custody in that great national storehouse in Chancery
Lane termed the Public Record Office. So far as we are aware, they have
never hitherto attracted the attention of any students of Derbyshire
history, or of any topographical writers. At all events, nothing has
hitherto been printed about them, although in many ways they are of
superlative interest.
George, Earl of Shrewsbury, the Lord-Lieutenant of the county, so
celebrated in history as the custodian of Mary Queen of Scots, was
taken again into the favour of Queen Elizabeth in his old age in
1587; he died in 1590. Some time between these two dates the Earl was
permitted to purchase a portion of the Longdendale district of the
Peak Forest, which was formally disafforested for the purpose. In
connection with this purchase, a large quaint map of the whole of the
three great divisions of the forest was prepared, on which are marked
large parallelograms, painted vermilion, where there were pasturage
rights. On the Ashop and Edale section of the forest four contiguous
large patches of vermilion are shown; these are lettered “quenes
farmes in Ashop and Edall.” Immediately to the west of these is another
large parallelogram, divided into five by parallel lines, and by the
side of this is “Edall the Quenes ma^{tes} Farmes are devided into Fyve
vacaries.” To the north of these pasturage grounds there are large
uncoloured spaces marked “Greate Waste,” and the same term is repeated
on a smaller patch to the south-east.
The section on the north-west of this plan, termed Longdendale, has
“Greate Waste” marked in various places over by far the greater portion
of the area. There is, however, a small vermilion parallelogram between
the towns of Glossop and Hayfield, the herbage of which pertained to
the Earl of Shrewsbury. A larger space in this section of the forest is
marked “The Herbage of Chynley, otherwise called Maidstonfeld. Godfrey
Bradshawe and others farm’s thereof.”
The third or southern section of the forest, called the Champion
or Champayne, has fully half of its area coloured red in somewhat
irregular patches. The largest space in the centre is lettered “The
Severalles of the Champyon,” and within this is a smaller area termed
“The Inner Severalles.” Attached to the larger space at different
angles are other areas marked “Halsted Harbage,” “Grene,” “Ferfeld
Harbage,” “Tyddeswall Harbage,” and “The Herbage of Boughtedge,
Tenauntes and Fermers thereof, viz.: Thomas Lee, Henry Bagshawe, and
George Thornehill.” There are also two nearly adjacent small patches of
which the names are not clear.
It thus becomes evident that it was only the townships or hamlets of
the Champayne division of the forest which had any claim to general
pasturage rights.
The highly interesting feature of this late Elizabethan plan is the
series of little outline pictures illustrative of the buildings of the
chief places within the forest district. Each of these is here given in
exact outline after the original, except that there is a dash of colour
on the roofs of all the buildings, which throws them into better
relief. Interesting as these are from an art point of view, they have
to be accepted with some caution as accurate in a topographical sense.
It is not, for instance, possible to imagine but that the sketch of the
Peak Castle was somewhat imaginary; nor can the sketches of some of
the churches be made to fit with the extant fabrics. It should also be
remarked that this plan is a good deal blemished in places by having
been roughly divided into three parts, with the result that several
fragments are now missing, and the sketches of Castleton and Hayfield
are somewhat mutilated.[77]
[77] When the list of the Duchy of Lancaster Maps and Plans was
recently drawn up and printed at the Public Record Office, the fact
that these three portions belonged to the same map was not recognised;
they are to be found under the respective numbers 7, 37, and 44.
[Illustration: No. 1.]
The view of Glossop may certainly be taken to prove that the old town
had its houses arranged in irregular blocks round the large church
as a centre (1). The parish church of Glossop was completely rebuilt
between 1831 and 1853; it is not, therefore, possible to say how far
the outline in the map is accurate. It is, however, fair to assume,
with regard to the churches as well as the houses, that the artist made
some effort to represent the reality, or otherwise the series of little
pictures would hardly have had so great a variety.
With regard to Hayfield church, the like difficulty arises, for the
old building was demolished in 1836; and here again it is difficult to
believe that the delineator drew this form of a church out of his own
imagination (2). In this case a portion of the hamlet on the left-hand
side has been torn off.
[Illustration: No. 2.]
The third pictured town in this division is Mellor, and in this
instance, too, the church was entirely rebuilt at the beginning of
last century, save for the western tower (3). A proof is here afforded
of some measure of accuracy, for in this case the western tower is
represented in its right place, and not as rising from the centre of
the building, as shown in the cases of Glossop and Hayfield. There
are, also, traces at the top of Mellor tower of its having formerly
supported a small spire, as is here shown.
[Illustration: No. 3.]
In the second division of the forest, viz., that of Ashop and Edale,
there are two of these township pictures, viz., Castleton and Hope.
Castleton is, unfortunately, mutilated; the parts to the left hand
of the castle are missing. As to Peak Castle, it is fairly obvious
that some effort, however poor, has been made to reproduce the actual
buildings (4). The old Norman keep of the time of Henry II. is
evidently intended to be shown in the centre of the background. The
fore-part shows the later substantial enclosing of the inner bailey,
probably of Edwardian date, most of which has long ago disappeared.
Perhaps the most interesting detail of this, the oldest picture of
the celebrated fortress, is the building within the bailey which is
surmounted by a cross, and is, therefore, clearly a detached chapel.
There are two or three entries in the record history of the Peak Castle
which have not yet been made public, which refer to this chapel as in
use in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. As to the church in the
town below, it is difficult to offer any conjecture as to how the
drawing can coincide with the present remains of the ancient church.
The draftsman seems to have had very exaggerated ideas as to the size
of the south porch.
With regard to the picture of Hope, little more can be said than that
here again it is very difficult to fit in this outline drawing with the
fabric of the church as it now exists, except that the western tower
still bears a low broached spire (5).
[Illustration: No. 4.]
The third, or Champayne, division of the forest has pictures of four
towns, viz., those of Chapel-en-le-Frith, Fairfield, Wormhill, and
Tideswell.
The various buildings that are grouped round the large church of
Chapel-en-le-Frith are sufficient to show that this old market town was
a place of some importance (6). In this case the church was rebuilt
throughout in the early part of last century, and there is very little
of historical record or other remains to tell us anything as to its
original proportions. There is, however, one gruesome record which
apparently shows that its size was considerably greater than that of
its successor; for in 1648 fifteen hundred prisoners of the Scottish
army defeated at Preston were confined within its walls when being
marched to London. They were kept in the church for over a fortnight,
and it is not surprising to learn that upwards of fifty died within
its walls. The outline drawing seems to suggest that the church was
of cruciform shape, with a tower and spire in the centre. The only
indication of a window is the large circular one of the south transept
over the porch; it is exceedingly unlikely that the draftsman produced
such a window as this from his own imagination.
[Illustration: No. 5.]
The destruction of the old churches in the Peak district was sadly
extensive about a hundred years ago. Another of the victims of the
then prevalent idea of running up a snug, cheap building, when the
old fabric had got into a state of dilapidation, was the church of
Fairfield, near Buxton (7). It was rebuilt in the years 1838–9, and
very little is known as to its original condition.
Wormhill, again, suffered after a like fashion, though at a later date
(8). The present church was rebuilt in 1863–4.
Tideswell is, perhaps, the most puzzling of all these pictures. Those
who know the singularly fine church of fourteenth century date, with
large chancel, transepts, double-aisled nave, and western tower, will
find it impossible to reconcile the outlined drawing with the church as
it really exists (9).
[Illustration: No. 6.]
We now come to the consideration of a considerably later series of
maps, which are done roughly to scale, of various townships within the
Peak forest. Derbyshire is exceptionally fortunate in having such a
series of carefully-preserved early plans. A list of the records of the
Duchy of Lancaster preserved at the Public Record Office was printed
in 1901. One section of this list is headed, “Maps and Plans”; they
consist principally of those made in the elucidation of the claims of
parties in disputes pending in the Court of the Duchy Chamber. The
three to which we have just referred are of the end of Elizabeth’s
reign, but otherwise they are almost entirely of various seventeenth
century dates. There are 116 items calendared as maps and plans at the
Public Record Office, of which Derbyshire has a large share, viz., 32,
or more than a quarter of the whole number. The reason for the making
of all these Derbyshire plans, save the three already mentioned, was
the enclosing or disafforesting of the Peak.
[Illustration: No. 7.]
During the reign of Charles I. many unhappy efforts were made to raise
funds for the Crown by re-establishing the almost extinct forest
courts. This was chiefly the work of Noy, the King’s Attorney-General,
styled by Carlyle “that invincible heap of learned rubbish.”
The revival of these courts, with all their costly and obsolete
formalities, accompanied by the imposition of absurdly heavy fines,
created bitter resentment wherever it was carried out, as in Surrey,
Berkshire, and Oxfordshire, and was, beyond doubt, one of the causes
that led to the Commonwealth trouble. In other parts of England where
there were royal forests, after the reimposition of forest law had
been so strenuously resisted, another line of action was adopted.
Attempts were made, occasionally with success, to secure money for
the Crown by the enclosure of forests, the Crown claiming a half, or
thereabouts, of the land, and selling them as soon as a title was
gained. This action led to continuous disturbance in Duffield, in the
south of Derbyshire, where the resistance made to enclosure by the
commoners and tenants was eventually successful.
[Illustration: No. 8.]
In the Peak, however, the destruction done to the crops by the small
remnant of the once vast herds of red deer was so persistent that the
commoners and others were only too ready to assent to any just scheme
of disafforesting. In 1635, various of the landowners and commoners of
the Peak petitioned the King, complaining of the severity, trouble,
and rigour of the forest laws, and praying that the deer, which were
still in sufficient numbers to do no small damage to the crops within
the forest and its purlieus, might be destroyed, and asking to be
allowed to compound by enclosing and improving the same. Thereupon a
commission of enquiry was issued, and two juries were empanelled, with
surveyors to assist them. The first jury viewed the whole forest and
its purlieus, and presented that the King might improve and enclose
one moiety in consideration of his rights, and that the other moiety
should be enclosed by the tenants, commoners and freeholders. The
second jury was empanelled to specially consider the case of the towns
within the purlieus, and they presented that the King, in view of the
largeness of the commons belonging to the towns of Chelmorton, Flagg,
Taddington, and Priestcliffe, might reasonably have for improvement and
enclosure one-third, and the remaining two-thirds for the commoners
and freeholders. A like division was to be adopted in several parts
within the forest. After some delay the commons were measured, and
surveys made of the different townships, dividing the land into three
sorts—best, middle, and worst, and the King’s share in each was
staked, and maps showing the results were drafted. The surveys were
not completed until 1640, and when all the preliminaries had been
adjusted, the King caused all the deer to be destroyed or removed, and
from that date onwards red deer were unknown within the High Peak. The
extirpation of the deer was, however, almost immediately followed by
the beginning of those “troublous times” which preceded the outbreak of
the Civil War. The whole of the proceedings towards enclosure fell into
abeyance. Soon after the restoration of the monarchy, much discussion
arose as to the revival of these projects, but it was not until 1674
that the proposals for disafforesting the open or waste portions of
the Peak Forest, and enclosing the portions that were capable of
cultivation or good for pasture, were completed. The Commissioners
appointed for this purpose were Sir John Gell, Sir John Cassy, and
fifteen others, including such well-known Peak names as Bagshawe, Eyre,
and Shallcross. The third portion assigned absolutely to the Crown was
almost immediately granted by letters patent to Thomas Eyre, of Gray’s
Inn, who speedily entered upon and enclosed the same, notwithstanding
certain futile opposition in the duchy court.
[Illustration: No. 9.]
It must have been a great assistance to the labours of these
commissioners to find that the maps of the time of Charles I., showing
the exact measurements and the three sorts of land, were still extant.
These maps, though of rough execution, are of the highest interest.[78]
[78] The following are the Record Office numbers of the maps of Charles
I.’s time:—13, Taddington and Priestcliffe; 14, 17, 22, 72, Bowden
Middlecale, etc.; 15, Castleton Commons; 18, Wormhill Commons; 19 and
107, Bradwell; 20, Mellor Moor and Commons; 23 and 79, Bowden Chapel;
38, Fairfield; 39, Hope; 40, Monyash; 89, Flagg and Chelmorton. There
are also three of Charles II. date, viz.:—16, Hope, wastes and commons;
75, Taddington; and 83, Bowden Middlecale.
[Illustration: No. 10.]
There are small, rudely-drawn and occasionally coloured outlines of
churches and houses on most of these maps. They are of a decidedly
inferior character to those on the large Elizabethan survey, but they
are still of some value. We give here two facsimiles of drawings
of Mellor church, and one of Fairfield (10). Those of Mellor are
sufficient to show that there was an aisled nave and a lower chancel in
addition to the surviving western tower. The tower appears to have lost
its low spire between the days of Elizabeth and Charles I. The drawing
of Fairfield seems to give a certain rough idea of what the old church
was like.
Occasionally the drawings on these plans, to denote the situation
of the more important halls or manor houses, are sufficient to give
a crude notion of the actual building. This is rather specially
the case with the Ridge Hall; it was a chief seat of the prolific
Bagshawe family, on the higher slopes of the hills to the west of
Chapel-en-le-Frith, which we know they occupied as early as the reign
of Edward II. (11). This hall was rebuilt on a large gabled scale in
the later Tudor or Elizabethan days. The two drawings here reproduced
are from maps of the respective reigns of Charles I. and Charles II.;
in the latter case the artist has made some endeavour to represent the
trees by which the hall was surrounded.
[Illustration: No. 11.]
The drawing of Bradshawe Hall, from a plan of 1640, is almost ludicrous
from its lack of resemblance to the real building, but seems to be
worth giving from its quaintness.
On one of the later maps the houses are drawn with more precision; but,
unfortunately, the names are not attached to some of the best examples
(in Mellor township), of which we here give two reproductions (12). The
very old set of lime-kilns at Dove Holes are most quaintly delineated
on three of the surveys.
[Illustration: No. 12.]
By far the most interesting feature of these maps, in the eyes at
least of an antiquary, are the numerous instances in which crosses are
marked. The remains of crosses and cross stumps on these Derbyshire
moors have been casually noticed from time to time by cursory writers.
In a paper contributed to the _Reliquary_ many years ago, when under
the editorship of Mr. Llewellynn Jewitt, it was asserted with some
confidence that these crosses marked out the three great divisions or
wards of the Forest of Peak. This was a natural kind of guess to make,
but investigation immediately proved that such a supposition was quite
baseless. With the possible solitary exception of the cross on the old
pack-horse track from the head of Edale into Hayfield, not one of these
crosses has any possible connection with forest bounds. Nor are they,
as has been conjectured by another writer, terminal stones of monastic
lands, for we know with a fair amount of accuracy the directions in
which such lands lay, and in no one case do these crosses correspond
with such limits. It is also quite obvious that for the most part
these Peak crosses cannot, by any stretch of imagination, be described
as mere wayside crosses, either to mark some special incident or
tragedy, or to excite the Christian devotion of the wayfarer; and this
for the simple reason that the majority of the crosses do not appear to
have been on any frequented track of either the remote or nearer past.
Nor is it possible to conceive, by those who have visited any number of
them, that they could have been utilized for the purposes of guiding or
general direction.