TOWN GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC SERVICES.
Warminster had the status of a borough
in late Saxon times, and still contained burgesses
in 1086. (fn. 1) In the 14th and 15th centuries a court
called a portmote was held in the town every three
weeks; in 1348-9 it was kept by a portreeve. (fn. 2) It was
distinct from the manorial courts, and no doubt
only had jurisdiction over the urban area, perhaps
even only over the area east of Almshouse Bridge
which, it is suggested above, formed the 'new port'. (fn. 3)
Nothing is known of any other burghal institutions,
and the town was never represented in Parliament.
In the mid-13th century William Mauduit was
holding a court in which he claimed the liberty of
trying and hanging thieves. (fn. 4) Later in the century
the lord of Warminster had a gallows called Alkemere, which it was said interfered with the jurisdiction of the Abbot of Glastonbury in Longbridge
Deverill. (fn. 5) A three-weekly manorial court and a
twice-yearly court-leet were being held in the late
Middle Ages. (fn. 6) No records remain to illustrate their
work before the 17th century. They were then described as the courts of Warminster town and
liberty, or of the in-hundred, and were attended
by the tithingmen of Warminster, Avenel's Fee,
and Boreham. In the 17th and 18th centuries they
appointed haywards, bread weighers, shamble
wardens, leather sealers, ale tasters, viewers of
commons, viewers of firehearths, and constables.
The chief business was presentment of breaches
of the agricultural custom, of strays, and of nuisances. (fn. 7) It is not known how long the three-weekly
courts continued to be kept, but the court-leet was
still held in the mid-19th century. (fn. 8) Its meeting was
only annual, and was largely occupied with food
and drink. (fn. 9)
Sir John Thynne was high steward of Warminster in 1553, (fn. 10) and Giles Estcourt in 1574. (fn. 11) No
more is known of this office, and the chief manorial
officer in later times was the bailiff. From the 16th
century it was customary to lease the bailiwick of
the town on lives, generally though not always with
the hundred bailiwick. (fn. 12) The lessee occupied, or
could underlet, the office, and enjoyed the profits
of the courts leet and baron, of the fairs and markets,
of the guildhall and the stalls and shambles in the
Market Place, and of certain houses near Almshouse Bridge. (fn. 13) The lease was clearly profitable and
was held by men of substance; lessees for a large
part of the 17th century were the Sloper family,
tenants of the manor farm. (fn. 14) In the early 18th
century the tolls of the markets and fairs were
deducted from the lease, although the profits of the
stalls and shambles remained. The last lease of the
bailiwick on lives fell in hand in 1758, and the
profits were afterwards let at rack with the tolls
added again. (fn. 15) They were still held like this in the
mid-19th century, (fn. 16) and the office of bailiff was
held by the manager of the corn market in 1903, (fn. 17)
long after it had ceased to have any significance in
local government. Of the other manorial officers,
the high constable was still performing some minor
functions in the 1860's, (fn. 18) and a hayward was still
exercising his office in 1868, when he was involved
in a lawsuit about impounding cattle. (fn. 19)
A 'tolseld' stood in Warminster in the late 14th
century. (fn. 20) In the middle of the next century rents
were received both for a novam aulam placitorum,
with shops beneath it, and a vetus aulam placitorum. (fn. 21)
The latter was probably the same as the old tolseld
repaired in 1563-4. (fn. 22) It may have stood near the
eastern corner of the Market Place and Weymouth
Street, for the 'Plume of Feathers', later the 'King's
Arms', which stood there until the 1830's, was
traditionally said to be a former town hall. (fn. 22) The
new hall was no doubt that called in 1516-17 the
'yelde hall' and council house, (fn. 24) and later generally
the Guildhall. (fn. 25) It stood in the centre of the road
where High Street and the Market Place join,
opposite the entrance into Common Close. The
medieval building was subsequently added to. A
'little shed house' which stood at the west end in
1575 (fn. 26) had been replaced a century later by a 'newerected' hall, with an open place underneath it. (fn. 27)
The date 1711 which appeared on the west wall
when it was demolished may have referred to a
further extension or to repairs. (fn. 28) The building was
used for public meetings ranging from the holding
of the summer Quarter Sessions to balls and
assemblies; part of the lower stage was used as a
blind house or town prison, and the poor were
customarily paid there. (fn. 29) Market stalls stood
beneath it, and part was used as a wool hall. (fn. 30) It
was a serious obstruction to the highway through
the town, and was demolished in 1832; the present
building at the junction of the Market Place and
Weymouth Street was provided by the Marquess of
Bath and opened in the same year. (fn. 31) It was
designed by Edward Blore. The stone front is in a
Tudor style reminiscent of Longleat. The building
was given to the town by the fifth marquess in 1903.
The vestry, which shared the government of the
town with the decaying court leet, was active from
at least the early 17th century. (fn. 32) It was always
'open', and in the 19th century was evidently
attended by considerable numbers of ratepayers,
sometimes as many as 200. (fn. 33) There were overseers
of the poor in 1616, when the manor court ordered
that certain poor cutters of wood should be taken
before them to decide their fitness for that liberty. (fn. 34)
The overseers were no doubt the same as the collectors for the poor, who were appointed in the
vestry in 1620. (fn. 35) There was a poor man's box, in
which a few shillings a year were collected, in the
later 1620's. (fn. 36) Little is known about poor relief,
however, until near the end of the century, when
a volume of overseers' accounts begins in 1687.
From that date expenditure rose gradually and
intermittently, from under £200 in the 1680's to a
figure generally over £400 between 1710 and 1720. (fn. 37)
About 1727 a poor house was built at Warminster
Common by Lord Weymouth, apparently in exchange for consent to his inclosing some waste
lands. An offer by him to undertake the perpetual
relief of all the chargeable poor of the parish in
return for permission to inclose all the waste lands
was rejected. The workhouse was a failure in the
end, (fn. 38) although it was perhaps responsible for a
fall in expenditure between 1732 and 1736, when
the highest figure was only £318. For the next two
decades it was generally over £500, and more than
twice that sum in the worst years. (fn. 39) In 1757 Lord
Weymouth paid the parish £300 for the right to
inclose some more common lands, and the money
was used towards building a workhouse at Warminster Common and inclosing some land near
it for a garden. (fn. 40) Salaried masters were appointed
for the remainder of the century, and there is no
evidence of farming out the poor there. (fn. 41) Expenditure on the poor rose slightly in the 1770's and
1780's. The average from 1774 to 1782 was £1,138;
the appointment of a salaried assistant overseer
from 1783 resulted in a slight improvement for a
few years, and a committee of the vestry found that
further improvement might be made by reducing
the number of inmates in the workhouse, whose
upkeep cost over 2s. a week each, while those on
outdoor relief cost less than 1s. (fn. 42)
In 1790 distress in the town was so great that
£140 was subscribed and distributed in money,
bread, and fuel to 466 families. (fn. 43) From that time
expenditure on the poor increased rapidly, reaching
over £5,500 in 1801 and being generally between
£3,000 and £5,000 between then and 1835. (fn. 44) In
1821 the workhouse, 'a most grievous concentration
of every species of vice', usually contained from 90
to 100 paupers, but by 1824 rigid scrutiny had
reduced the number to about 30. (fn. 45) An account of
the administration of the poor law in Warminster in
1832 is probably typical of most of the period of
large expenditure since 1790. The vestry appointed
four overseers, chiefly tradesmen, who with the
churchwardens assessed and levied the rates and
spent the money. They were assisted by a salaried
assistant overseer, and subject to the scrutiny of
the vestry at its monthly meetings. Only 18 poor
were in the workhouse, mainly aged and impotent;
their upkeep cost the parish about £12 each a year.
Some 70 or 80 labourers were wholly on the parish
during the summer and 120 or 140 in the winter.
They were employed upon the roads when possible.
A much larger number, 900 in September 1832, (fn. 46)
received out-relief because their earnings were not
sufficient to support their families. The parish
objected to employers paying under 9s. a week;
with that sum, a man was given 1s. 6d. a week if
he had four children, and 2s. 6d. for five, but
nothing for less than four. (fn. 47)
The vestry appointed surveyors of the highways
by 1620, (fn. 48) but they were probably able to do no
more than deal with the worst places, for the roads
of the town were generally in a miserable state. (fn. 49)
The appointment of scavengers in 1736 with power
to raise a 6d. rate (fn. 50) was probably ineffective, and
the earliest real improvements in the town probably
date from the establishment of a turnpike trust in
1727. The trust's activities were largely confined
to roads within the parish; some of its road improvements have been described above. (fn. 51) In 1792
the trustees were given additional powers to provide
and repair pavements in some streets and to order
the removal of nuisances. (fn. 52) The surveyors appointed by the vestry still remained responsible
for most of the parish. Together they seem to have
achieved a certain amount. In 1809 a barrel-drain
was made in the Market Place. (fn. 53) William Daniell,
the Methodist overseer, was appointed surveyor in
1822, and after great exertions was able to remove
the heaps of filth which stood before most of the
doorways at the Common and to prevent them
from being replaced. (fn. 54) In the early 1830's the parish
improved many roads, the money coming from
the poor rates and labour from the unemployed
poor. (fn. 55)
In 1835 the parish was able to set up a more
effective authority for the repair of the roads. This
was a Highway Board, a committee of the vestry
appointed under the Act of that year. (fn. 56) The board
was active in its early years; William Daniell was
appointed as salaried assistant surveyor, and
between 1836 and 1840 the board laid several drains
in various parts of the town and widened the road
in East Street. In 1840 it successfully opposed the
renewal of the turnpike commissioners' powers
relating to pavements and the removal of nuisances. (fn. 57)
In 1856 it proceeded against tradesmen who obstructed the pavement with their goods. (fn. 58) In 1859-
60 it spent £386, (fn. 59) presumably on the maintenance
of minor roads, pavements, and drains, and these
were probably its chief concern until it was replaced in 1867. The vestry also delegated some of
its local government powers to a body of Inspectors
of Lighting and Watching appointed under the
Lighting and Watching of Parishes Act of 1833. (fn. 60)
In the early 1860's its chief functions were the
supervision of the lighting of the main streets of
the town by gas and of the town's fire engines.
Between £300 and £400 were spent each year, most
of which was paid to the Gas Company. (fn. 61) Beside
these two permanent bodies it was customary to
appoint boards of health to deal with outbreaks of
disease in the town. Such a board was appointed in
the cholera outbreak of 1832; (fn. 62) in 1858 a board of
health was compelled to undertake the abatement
of the nuisance created by the sewage in the Swan
River, and the vestry appointed a committee to
co-operate with it. (fn. 63)
Thus before the formation of the Local Board of
Health, the government of Warminster was shared
between the vestry and its committees, the turnpike
trusts, and the ad hoc boards of health. Little
money was available, and some of the greatest
permanent improvements, such as the reconstruction of George Street from 1807 (fn. 64) and the supply
of water to the Common in 1849, (fn. 65) were the result
of private efforts. In 1860 the road from Portway
to the station, now the Avenue, was repaired by
subscription. (fn. 66) Even normal services were given
grudgingly; in 1859 the Highway Board decided
not to water the streets at the expense of the parish,
but to make the carts available to private people who
wished to do so. (fn. 67)
A Local Board of Health was set up in 1867. (fn. 68)
It consisted of 15 members, a third of whom
retired each year. It immediately appointed a
clerk, a treasurer, a surveyor, and a rate-collector,
none of them apparently full-time officials. The
practice of appointing permanent committees was
begun in 1869, when finance and general purpose
committees were formed; other committees followed as the work of the board increased.
The board at first simply assumed the functions
of the Highway Board and the Inspectors of
Lighting and Watching. An inspector of nuisances
was appointed, and some show of ordering their
abatement was made, particularly the cleaning of
water-courses, the fixing of gutters on houses,
and the cleansing of slaughterhouses. The three
town fire engines were found to be in as good order
as their age would allow, and a proposal to buy a
new one was dropped. The largest items in the
first year's estimate of £743 were £324 for street
lighting and £210 for highways and cleaning the
streets. Only £30 were allowed for drains and
pavements. An outbreak of smallpox was dealt
with by the old expedient of a temporary board of
health. The town board had little inclination to
seek new responsibilities. In 1869 it resolved that
it had no present intention of altering the system
of drainage, and it would only proceed with the
reconstruction of the Common water-supply if
half the cost could be raised by subscription. (fn. 69) In
1873, however, the board appointed a medical
officer of health. Three years later the Local Government Board asked what the board intended to do
about the unsatisfactory privies mentioned in the
medical officer's reports. Between 1876 and 1878
there were outbreaks of scarlet fever and typhoid,
and the government began to complain repeatedly
about the lack of sewerage and the pollution of the
Swan River. It was the threat of action under the
Rivers Pollution Prevention Act of 1876 (fn. 70) that
eventually forced the board into tardy action in
1880.
The sewerage committee appointed by the board
produced a scheme amended from one which had
been prepared for the former Highway Board in
1867. It involved collecting most of the town's
sewage in a sewer, running down the Swan River
from Almshouse Bridge, and taking it to meadows
near the Wylye on the Bishopstrow boundary,
where it would be filtered by being spread over
several acres of land. Smaller schemes were to
take sewage from Boreham to the same area and
from the Common to another site at Henford's
Marsh. After much discussion the lease of a piece
of land was secured from Lord Bath, and the scheme
came into use in 1883. The board experienced
much difficulty in making property owners connect
their houses to the scheme; in 1884 few cesspits
had been done away with, and in 1886 the river was
still very foul from sewage which ran into it from
the Manor House. In spite of the imperfections of
the system, Warminster was the first of the smaller
towns in the county to have one at all. (fn. 71)
The other main problem which faced the local
board was that of water supply, and on this it was
also slow to act. We have seen that the Common
supply was left to private initiative and only
received partial support from the board. In 1872
its extension to the Marsh side of the Common was
carried out in the same way, and even in the late
1880's, after the inauguration of the town supply,
the Common scheme was still run by a private
committee. The first move to supply the town itself
came from a London civil engineer in 1882. This
provoked a public meeting in the town the following year at which a motion in favour of having a
supply was defeated. A majority of the members of
the board at this time wanted a supply, and an
engineer was called in, and negotiations begun with
Lord Bath for the use of a spring at Aucombe
near Shearwater. At the 1884 election four of the
five members returned were opposed to having a
supply, but this still left a narrow majority in
favour. A public enquiry was held, and much evidence given about the pollution of the wells from
which the town was supplied; in the courts off
East Street the water was the colour of porter.
Nevertheless a majority of ratepayers, led by Sir
James Philipps, the vicar, were violently opposed
to being supplied by the board. The plans were
approved by the government, and pushed on with
as fast as possible; by the next election in 1885 they
were well advanced, but again four opponents of
the scheme were returned, including Philipps
himself. A resolution was immediately passed that
the works should be transferred to a private company, and Philipps began to negotiate privately
with Lord Bath for him to take it over. This action,
taken without the knowledge of the board, evidently
caused much offence to the other members, and
was probably the reason why several of the opponents changed sides and enabled the board to carry
out the original scheme after all.
The minor activities of the board can be quickly
dealt with. The houses of the town were numbered
in 1876. Three years later the board bought a house
in South Street at the Common for an infectious
diseases hospital to replace the old practice of using
any empty house available. Medical opinion in the
town was against the site, and the Local Government Board refused a loan. The collection of house
refuse was begun in 1880, and in the same year a
Fire Brigade committee was formed. In 1886 a
Volunteer Fire Brigade was established, to which
the board agreed to contribute. An anonymous
donor gave a second-hand manual engine which
required 22 men to work it, (fn. 72) and the three old
engines were sold.
Figure 6:
Urban District of Warminster
Gold, a man on a horse and riding towords the sinister, brandishing in his right hand a sword, its blade bendwise-sinister, all proper the surcoat and shield azure lined gules, the horse sable with bardings gules lines azure. [granted 1948]
Warminster Urban District Council was formed
under the Local Government Act of 1894. It
consists of 15 members
of whom a third retire
annually. As with its predecessor, the first problem
which faced the council
was one of sewage disposal.
There were still parts of
the town not served by
the system, including The
Furlong and new houses
on the Imber road,
beside more outlying parts
such as Woodcock and
Hillwood Lane. At the
Common some sewage
still ran into the stream.
There were also frequent
complaints about smells
from the sewage farm,
and the government urged
that the whole system should be reviewed. When
this was done it was found that the farm was illarranged and too small. After much consideration
it was decided to pump the sewage to a more
suitable area. Smallbrook Mill was bought for the
purpose, and a piece of sloping land north-east of
Butler's Coombe Farm was adopted as the new
farm. The work of laying new sewers in areas not
previously served was still going on in 1901. Since
the turn of the century the council has taken many
new responsibilities which can only be briefly summarized here. In 1904 it took a lease of the markets
and fairs from Lord Bath, and bought them from
him in 1920. (fn. 73) A housing committee was established
in 1911 and the first housing scheme was begun
in 1919.
The Volunteer Fire Brigade was taken over in
1913, and the Lake Pleasure Grounds were laid
out in 1924. (fn. 74) In 1955 the council bought Portway
House for use as offices, and in 1960 the sewage
works were reconstructed.
In 1895 the council adopted for use on its seal
the device of the Mauduit family as depicted by
Hoare, an armed knight on horseback. A grant
of this device as arms was obtained in 1948. (fn. 75)
A cottage hospital was built in 1866 on the site
of Portway Farm; (fn. 76) it was enlarged in 1892 and
1899, (fn. 77) and replaced by the present building in
1932. The Isolation Hospital on Bradley Road was
built by a joint committee of the urban and rural
councils in 1915, and transferred to the Trowbridge
committee in 1934. (fn. 78)
In 1840 the inspector in charge of the newlyformed county police at Warminster lived at the
London Inn. (fn. 79) Two years later the police office
was in Weymouth Street; (fn. 80) it was subsequently
moved to the yard ajoining no. 6 Market Place. (fn. 81) In
1857 a police station was built in Ash Walk; (fn. 82) it
remained in use until 1932, when the present one
in Station Road replaced it. (fn. 83) The building in Ash
Walk was in 1963 used partly as a Christian Science
church.
In 1723 the deputy-postmaster of Hungerford
(Berks.) had the supervision of the postal service
at Warminster. (fn. 84) In the early 19th century the post
office was in George Street; it moved to the building now no. 6 Market Place c. 1862, and thence to
part of the Savings Bank building opposite in
1903. (fn. 85)
The Warminster Gas and Coke Company was
founded in 1834, (fn. 86) and a gasworks built at Brick
Hill. Lighting of the streets was begun in the same
year. (fn. 87) The company obtained fresh powers in
1889. (fn. 88)