following experiment worked by the learned doctor with the local mineral
waters:--
"I evaporated in a brass furnace 13.5 gallons to 3 quarts, then let
it stand 3 days to settle, and poured the clear water from the
foeces. This was a light smooth insipid earth of a yellow colour,
fat between the fingers, insipid and impalpable, which being dried,
weighed 93 grains. The remaining 3 quarts I evaporated in a brass
kettle and had from it 53 grains of a very salt glutinous substance
which dried into a solid mass of a brown colour. When the water came
to a pint or thereabout, it began to smell like glew, and continued
to do so when in a solid substance; it was then also as high-coloured
as lye; but I am afraid this colour might arise from the brass
kettle, in some measure, or too great a fire, being perhaps burnt."
Another of his scientific records runs:--
"Oct. 9th.--I put into a Florence flask as much of this water as
filled it up to the neck within 5 inches of the top. This I placed
in a sand heat and increased the fire gradually till it boiled; and
so I evaporated ad siccitatem. Some volatile sal stuck to the glass
even up to the top; at the bottom was a small quantity of dark
coloured matter, like that above, but I could not get together 2
grains of either. Here it is plain this sal is so volatile as to be
raised and fly away by heat."
In another place he writes:--
"On the 5th of November, 1737, I filled several glasses with this
water, and put into them the following simples:--
1. Green Tea. This, in about 24 hours, made it of the colour of
sack, and, by standing, it became much deeper coloured, like strong
old beer.
2. Fustic; not so deep, more like cyder.
3. Red Sanders; almost the same colour in the light; but if I held
the glass in the shade, it appeared of a blueish green, exactly like
some old glass bottles I have formerly seen.
4. Alkanet; deeper, like old mountain wine.
5. Galls; paler than any of the foregoing. A large blue scum on the
top, such as we see upon urine in fevers, and standing lakes of
water, where there are minerals. With logwood, tormentil, cort,
granat, etc., there are some spots of this kind, but with none so
much as with galls.
"A little below the Spaw (continues our authority), on the other side
of the brook, they meet with a white clay, full of yellow veins of a
deep colour, like gumboge when it has been for some time exposed to
the air. These two they temper together and make into cakes, which
they sell to the glovers by the name of ochre cakes, and with them
they give a yellow colour to leather.
"Near the surface of the earth the country is for the most part a
strong clay, which makes good brick, but, for a small compass from
this Spaw all along the village on the north side of the brook we
have sand. Underground the whole country abounds with coal and
ironstone."
The glovers' handicraft, it may be mentioned in passing, was once
strongly represented in olden Darlaston.
The situation of Willenhall is by no means an elevated one, and the whole
plain in which it is situated formerly abounded in Springs, ere the
surface had been so much disturbed by mining operations.
On the edge of the valley, under the shadow of Sedgley Beacon, was the
famous Spring known as the Lady Wulfruna's, and which gave the place its
name, Spring Vale; from this spot the silvery stream flowed eastwards
into Willenhall, seeking the cool shade of the pleasant woodland there.
The stream, as it came in from Bilston, and ran eastwards through
Willenhall, till it met the Tame, was once called the Hind Brook, or Stag
River. In Saxon times the Tame here seems to have been designated
Beorgita's Stream; and Mr. G. T. Lawley, in his "History of Bilston,"
says that the original bed of this brook was discovered in Willenhall
some years ago when extensive excavations were being made.
So far the scientific aspect of this once famous Well. The popular view
of a much frequented mineral spring which had "long been celebrated for
disease of the eye and skin" opens out an even wider aspect. As
previously mentioned, the brook flowing past it ran from west to east; a
stream so directed was always accounted by the Druids of old as a sacred
watercourse. Being thus from the earliest dawn of history within sacred
precincts, there can be little doubt the Willenhall fountain enjoyed the
reputation of a "Holy well" for many centuries. As such it came in for
the annual custom of "well dressing," a vestige of the old pagan practice
of well worship. Respecting this ancient custom, Dr. Plot, writing in
1686 in his "Natural History of Staffordshire," says:--
"They have a custom in this county, which I observed on Holy Thursday
at Brewood and Bilbrook, of adorning their Wells with boughs and
flowers; this it seems they do at all gospel places, whether wells,
trees, or hills, which being now observed only for decency and
custom's sake, is innocent enough. Heretofore, too, it was usual to
pay their respect to such wells as were eminent for curing distempers
(one of which was at Wolverhampton in a narrow lane leading to a
house, called Sea-well; another at Willenhall; others at Monmore
Green, near Wolverhampton; at Codsall and many other parts of
Staffordshire) on the saint's day whose name the well bore; diverting
themselves with cakes and ale, and a little music and dancing; which,
whilst within bound, was also an innocent recreation."
Dr. Oliver says the beautiful spring at Dunstall was the favourite resort
of the Lady Wulfruna, and from contact with her sanctity acquired a
reputation for possessing healing virtues of a miraculous character, and
that this fountain was long known among its devotees as Wulfruna's Well.
Pitt's "History of Staffordshire," issued in 1817, gives a long list of
local wells bearing at that time some similar repute for their remedial
waters. Among them was Codsall Well, near Codsall Wood, supposed in
olden times to be efficacious in cases of leprosy, and adjacent to which
once stood a Leper House, replaced at a later period by a "Brimstone
Ale-house," so-called because the water was sulphureous. The waters of
the Monmore Green Well are described as containing "sulphur combined with
vitriol." The Sea-well Spring still retained its name as a "Spaw" famous
for its "eye water"; while those of Willenhall and Bentley were said to
yield a valuable remedial sulphur water so long as they "could be kept
from mixture with other waters."
Folklore not only connected these Wells with patron saints, but
associated their magic precincts and curative effects with beneficent
fairies. A well like that of Willenhall, which in a post-renaissance
period was honoured with a stone frontal bearing a Latin inscription,
would of a certainty be attended by fairy elves in an earlier and more
primitive era.
About this Spring (if ancient fame say true)
The dapper elves their midnight sports pursue;
Their pigmy king and little fairy queen,
In circling dances gambolled on the green,
While tuneful sprites a merry concert made
And airy music warbled through the shade.
[Picture: Decorative design]
XVIII.--The Benefice.
Owing to the meagreness of the record, a complete list of the holders of
the benefice is not to be expected. Thomas de Trollesbury has been named
as "the parson of Willenhall" in 1297 (Chapter VII.); while we also have
the names of three chantry priests here--William in the Lone, 1341
(Chapter XI.); Thomas Browning, "chaplain of the chantry" in 1397
(Chapter VII.); and Hugh Bromehall in 1526 (Chapter X.); all of them
doubtless nominees of the Deanery of Wolverhampton.
Of course, it was possible, though not often the practice, for the holder
of the living to act as "chaunter" priest as well. The Chantry
endowments, as we have seen, were forfeited at the Reformation, at which
period the benefice was returned as of the annual value of "10 pounds
clear."
Either of these notorious evil-livers mentioned in Chapter XI., the
non-preaching "dumb-dogs," Mounsell and Cooper, may have been the
occupant of the Willenhall curacy in 1586. In 1609 an improvement in the
intellectual status of the holder had been effected, William Padmore,
D.D., being then incumbent.
In a previous chapter it was shown that the Rev. T. Badland was expelled
from the living of Willenhall in 1662. It can now be shown that he was
holding the benefice at least as early as 1658--and possibly from the
beginning of the Cromwellian rule and the overthrow of the Episcopacy in
1646.
About 1645-6 ordinances were passed appointing a Committee to consider
ways and means of upholding and settling the maintenance of ministers in
England and Wales. In 1654 the powers of the Plundered Ministers'
Committee were transferred to the Trustees for Maintenance. The
Committee took the receipts of all Tithes, Fifths, and First Fruits; and
later on the income of the rectories, bishoprics, deaneries, and
chapters; they sold the bishops' lands, &c.
It was out of this income that augmentations and advances were granted by
the said Committee to ministers and school-masters. In the Record Office
at London there is an audited account the Treasurer to the "Trustees for
the Maintenance of Ministers and other pious uses of moneys," showing
among the disbursements for the year ending 26 December, 1658, one to
"Thomas Badland, of Willenhall (6 months to 1659, March 25) . . . 10
pounds."
In curious contrast with this high-minded clergyman, who sacrificed his
living to his conscience, is his successor in the Curacy of Willenhall,
the Rev. Mr. Gilpin, who had to be seriously admonished for non-residence
and other faults, and was at last, in the year 1674, turned out of the
living altogether. Not improbably this gentleman was a pluralist, an
example of the class of clergymen by which the Church of England was very
much degraded at that period.
Dr. Oliver's history printed the following "Dismissal of the Rev. Thomas
Gilpin," from the original document found in the possession of Mr. Neve,
of Wolverhampton, in 1836:--
We, whose names are subscribed, the undoubted and immediate lords of
the Manor of Stow Health, hearing and well weighing the said
complaints of the Inhabitants of the towne of Willenhall, lying
within our said Manor, made and brought against you, Thomas Gilpin,
clerk, Curate of the Chapell there:
Doe in consideration thereof and in pursuance of an Order made and
inrolled on some of the Rolls of the Court of our said Manor, bearing
date 11th day of October in the Sixth Year of the Reign of our late
Soveraigne, Lord, King James, over England, etc.
And of our power and authority thereby, Displace and Discharge you,
the said Thomas Gilpin, from the place, Dignity, and office of
Curate, Minister, or Priest in the said Chapell.
And do hereby present and allow John Carter, clerk (a person elected
and approved by the Inhabitants of Willenhall aforesaid), to be
Curate of the said Chapell in your place and stead, to read divine
service there; and to do and perform all such other offices and
things as shall properly belong to his Ministerial function and
calling.
And thus much you, the said Thomas Gilpin, are hereby desired to take
notice of.
Dated under our hands and seals this 18th day of November in the year
of our Lord God, 1674, and in the six-and-twentieth year of the
reigne of our Soveraigne Lord, Charles II., by the grace of God, King
of England, etc.
Walter Giffard. L.S.
W. Leveson Gower. L.S.
After the expulsion of Mr. Gilpin the Rev. John Carter, who was appointed
to succeed him, continued in the Curacy of Willenhall till his death in
1722. In 1727 mention is made of a Mr. Holbrooke being Curate of
Willenhall.
Soon after the Registers assist in tracing the successive holders of the
benefice. Here are three interesting memoranda, for instance, bearing
the signature of the Rev. Titus Neve:--
1748, March 4th.--The faculty for rebuilding and enlarging ye chapel
of Willenhall, ye then present minister, ye Rev. Titus Neve--(to
charge and receive certain fees, etc.)
1750, January 20.--Then it was yt service began to be performed in ye
New Chapel, after almost two years discontinuance, by Titus Neve,
Curate.
1763, February 17th.--Joyce Hill made oath that ye body of Benjamin
Stokes was buried in a shroud of Sheep's Wool only, pursuant to an
Act of Parliament in that case made and provided.--Witness my hand,
Titus Neve.
(This entry has reference to the Act for Burying in Woollen, one of those
pieces of legislative folly whereby it was sought to bolster up
artificially our decaying trade in wool.)
The Rev. Titus Neve, whose descendants at the present day are a
well-known Wolverhampton family, was born at Much Birch in Herefordshire,
son of the Rev. Thomas Neve, in 1717. He matriculated at Balliol
College, Oxford, became Rector of Darlaston, 1764, holding the two
livings, together with the Prebendary of Hilton his death in 1788. He
was buried at Willenhall.
A sermon preached by him in Worcester Cathedral on August 12th, 1762, was
printed in Birmingham by the celebrated Baskerville (see Simms'
"Bibliotheca Staffordiensis").
His successor was the Rev. William Moreton, who, according to an entry in
the Registers, was "sequestered to the vacant chapelry of Willenhall,
December 4th, 1788." Toward the close of his ministry Mr. Neve appears
to have had the assistance of Curates--George Lewis signs the Registers
as "Clerk, Curate" between December, 1778, and July, 1779; and the
signature of Mr. Moreton in the same capacity begins to appear in 1784.
Among the entries of the last-named is a record that in 1786 he paid the
"tax" on a number of Baptisms and Burials himself, whereas in 1785 he
shows that a "Collector" received it.
* * * * *
The advent of the Rev. W. Moreton marks an epoch, and we now turn aside
to consider the peculiar history of the Advowson, or right of
presentation to the living of Willenhall. In 1409 it is found in private
hands, being then the property of William Bushbury and his wife (see
Chapter VII.).
When the lord of a manor built a church on his own demesne, he often
appointed the tithes of the manor to be paid to the officiating minister
there, which before had been given to the clergy in common; the lord who
thus founded the church often endowed it with glebe, and retained the
power of nominating the minister (canonically qualified) to officiate
therein. But a chapel-of-ease like Willenhall, built by a resident in
the locality, often had its minister, maintained by the subscriptions of
persons living close around it, and they naturally claimed to elect their
own ministers. The authorities at the mother church would reserve the
right to approve and confirm, and would see that they suffered no loss of
fees and other emoluments.
An old book in the Registry at Windsor (without date) contains this
entry:--
The curacy of Willenhall is endowed with land to the value of 35
pounds. The lords of Stow Heath have, in the last two vacancies,
usurped upon the Dean and Chapter, and have nominated to it.
Shaw, the county historian, writing in 1798, after stating that whoever
holds the Curacy of Willenhall must have a licence from the Dean of
Wolverhampton, proceeds to say:--
There has been lately a serious contest between the Marquis of
Stafford and the inhabitants about the nomination of a curate.
The gift of the living (says the same authority), or nomination of
the minister or curate, is in the principal inhabitants that have
lands of inheritance here. He is to be approved of by the lords of
the manor, and admonished by them when he does amiss; and if he does
not amend in half a year, they may turn him out and nominate another.
This practice is believed to have existed in Willenhall since the time of
James I.
The power of the parishioners to elect their own clergymen, though not
common, exists in various parts of the country; as at Hayfield and
Chapel-in-le-Frith, both in Derbyshire; and in this more immediate
locality at St. John's Deritend, Birmingham, and at Bilston and Bloxwich,
nearer still.
In London the only example where the elective principle is employed in
the choice of a parish priest is presented by Clerkenwell. But
wheresoever a vacancy of the kind has to be filled by popular election,
with all the accessories incidental to the turmoil of Parliamentary
electioneering, all the bitterness of party strife, the parish is
inevitably divided into two or more factions; while the clergyman upon
whom the lot eventually falls must for a long time afterwards be regarded
as the nominee of one of them, rather than the spiritual director of the
whole body of the people. He succeeds to his high office as a victor in
a great parochial struggle which cannot fail to leave behind it those
feelings of rancour so harmful in matters sacred.
The only remedy for this state of things seems to be the voluntary
surrender of their privilege by the parishioners; or the provisions of a
special Act of Parliament.
As to the soundness of the general principle of a people being consulted
in the choice of their spiritual pastor, there can scarcely be two
opinions. But where the danger lurks in a case like that of Willenhall
is the assumption of our English law--an assumption quite unwarranted in
any country where freedom of conscience exists, and with us one of the
penalties for maintaining an established State Church--that every
parishioner is a Churchman.
Now, as a matter of fact, votes are recorded at these elections by
Romanists, by Dissenters of various shades of opinion, by those who are
unattached to any religious denomination, and by many who never, at other
times, take a great interest in Church of England affairs. At the last
election even trustees of Nonconformist chapels were empowered to vote if
they were householders, and the trust in respect of which they qualified
had been constituted by a properly executed deed. So it can scarcely be
claimed that the choice of minister rests solely with those most
concerned, namely, the congregation, the customary worshippers at St.
Giles's Church.
Resuming the story of the benefice at the election of 1788, it is said
that Mr. Moreton having been elected, the then lords of the manor
declined to present him to the bishop on the ground that they did not
regard him as a fit and proper person. Litigation ensued, and the High
Court of Justice declared the election void, and ordered a new one.
Meanwhile, the income seems to have sequestrated, probably lying in the
hands of the churchwardens till the new minister should be properly
instituted.
The electors for a second time returned Moreton, and the lords of the
manor then took up the attitude that it was not part of their duty to
live in litigation, either with the electors or with Moreton; they had
expressed their opinion of the man in the strongest manner possible, and
this they considered relieved them from further responsibility; so now at
the electors' wish they nominated him to the bishop for induction, and in
due course he was formally inducted.
The new incumbent of Willenhall was popularly given out to be an
illegitimate "nephew" of George III.; he bore a strong facial likeness to
the Royal family, and had been at college with the Duke of York. But
whatever his origin or extraction, he was a typical sporting parson of
the old school, an enthusiastic cock-fighter, and "a three-bottle man."
It was not long before the old mocking doggerel was applied to
Willenhall:--
A tumble-down church--
A tottering steeple--
A drunken parson--
And a wicked people!
That this old rhyme fairly described the condition of things we may
venture to believe if we can also accept as true the rhyme oft quoted by
this Willenhall worthy, and which was said to embody his philosophy:--
Let back and sides and head go bare,
Let foot and hand go cold,
But God send belly good ale enough,
Whether it be new or old.
Of "Parson Moreton" innumerable tales are told, all of them racy, though
not a few of them apochryphal. There can be little doubt that in the
later years of his life he was a bon vivant, and indulged openly in the
less refined sports of the period, a cockfight above all things having a
strong fascination for him.
And yet, on the plea that "a merciful man is good to his beast," he
indulged his old grey pony, "Bob," on which he regularly ambled about,
with a share of every tankard of ale he quaffed on his rounds, till the
knowing quadruped refused to pass any inn along the road for miles around
without stopping for refreshment.
Parson Moreton is not to be judged by modern standards. At that time the
church was asleep; and Dr. Johnson once declared that he did not know one
religious clergyman. Though the Parson of Willenhall became noted
throughout the countryside for his eccentricities, he managed to labour
among the rough population, to whom he ministered, with some sort of
success.
Into all his lapses from the conventionalities of clericalism, he was a
gentleman at the core, having a dignified bearing and a commanding
presence. He candidly admitted his shortcomings as a clergyman, telling
his flock to do as he said, not as he did. This naturally failed to
satisfy very many of them; and it has been asserted that the strength of
Dissent in Willenhall at the present time is directly due to the
influence of his incumbency.
Of the Rev W. Moreton, it may at least be said that he was a remarkably
fine reader, and his sermons were always well-constructed compositions.
For many years he lived with Mr. Isaac Hartill in the house at the corner
of the Market Place, opposite the Metropolitan Bank; an old house still
retaining its original oak floors and staircase, and its substantial
old-fashioned doors of the same material, although the building is now
made into two shops.
For nearly fifty years Parson Moreton was a familiar figure in the
streets of Willenhall. His last signature in the Registers appears in
1833, a year previous to which the Rev. George Hutchinson Fisher had come
into the parish to assist him, taking up his residence in the house next
to "The Neptune Inn," now the Police Station. He died July 16th, 1834,
and was buried on Sunday the 20th.
When Mr. Fisher came to preach Mr. Moreton's funeral sermon, the most
notable feature of the oration was the absence of direct reference to the
departed. Towards the close of the sermon, however, the following
passage was uttered with impressive solemnity:--
"May every occasion like the present bring instruction and
edification to your souls. May the failings which you have witnessed
and lamented in others urge you to examine and correct your own; and
when their removal makes you think on the nature of the account they
will have to render, may you be awakened to scrutinise your own
stewardship; and instead of recording the sins of the departed, seek
to be delivered, whilst the Redeemer invites you, from those which
are a burden to your consciences."
Truly a charitable and Christian-like obituary!
XIX.--How a Flock Chose its own Shepherd.
The living of St. Giles's, Willenhall, popularly supposed to be worth
some fourteen hundred pounds a year, the reversion of it was looked upon
with eager eyes by not a few of the surrounding clergy. Between
Darlaston and Willenhall, particularly, there seems to have existed some
sort of pretensions to a clerical inter-relationship.
The Rev. Titus Neve, who held the living of Willenhall from about 1748 to
1788, acted as Curate of Darlaston in 1760, and became Rector of that
parish in 1764; while his son, the Rev. Charles Neve, was also Curate
there from 1790 to 1793. The Willenhall record of his ministry and
interment runs:--
The Revd. Titus Neve, Minister, Curate, or Stipendiary Priest of
Willenhall Chapelry, Prebendary of Hilton and Sacrist of the
Collegiate Church of Wolverhampton, and Rector of Darlaston, in the
County of Stafford, departed this life December 23rd, 1788, and was
interred in the Chancel.
His successor, the Rev. William Moreton, went as Curate to Darlaston in
1786, and was sequestered to the vacant chapelry of Willenhall, December
24th, 1788, the day following Mr. Neve's decease.