PARISH GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC SERVICES.
Like many other royal manors of the Wessex kingdom, Westbury developed urban or semiurban institutions at a comparatively early date.
There were markets and fairs by the late 13th
century, (fn. 9) and a portmote by 1361. (fn. 10) Burgages are
mentioned in the later 14th century and their origin
is probably considerably earlier. (fn. 11) The burgages
naturally did not occupy the whole area of the
ancient parish but formed a number of small enclaves within it. Indeed at no time are 'Westbury'
and 'the borough of Westbury' to be equated. Sixteenth-century tax lists distinguish between the
tithing or township of Westbury on the one hand, and
the borough of Westbury on the other. (fn. 12) This distinction persisted, and by 1835 the borough was
held to include the ancient burgages, arranged in
three blocks, but to exclude the adjacent tithings of
'the town', and the 'chantry'. (fn. 13) Burgages apart, there
are other signs of the growth of a borough. The
portmote was being called 'the portmote of the
borough' in 1443 (fn. 14) and in 1448 the borough began
to be summoned to Parliament and continued to be
summoned thereafter. (fn. 15)
By the later 16th century there are some signs
that the customary organs of municipal government had begun to grow up, a growth fostered
perhaps by the knowledge that Westbury could
claim to be 'ancient demesne of the Crown' and
therefore ought to enjoy some privileges greater
than those accorded to a rural estate. A mayor is
mentioned in 1571, (fn. 16) a corporate seal was acquired
in 1591, (fn. 17) and a guildhall and court house existed
by 1599. (fn. 18) So far as is known, these organs of municipal independence, these trappings of civic pride,
did not mature and were not multiplied. No charter
was granted, nor was there even a declaration of
privileges such as the burgesses of Calne secured in
1569. (fn. 19) Indeed from the early 17th century onwards
the main function of the corporation— for such in
name it was—seems to have been to conduct
parliamentary elections.
The corporation is not described until 1835, on
the eve of its dissolution. (fn. 20) It then consisted of a
mayor, recorder, and 13 capital burgesses, who
formed a deliberative assembly called the General
Council. It also possessed a court. The only activity
of the council was said to be that of filling vacancies
among its own number and returning representatives to Parliament. The recorder was elected for
life. The mayor was elected annually by the assembly, but any number of capital burgesses, however
small, was considered competent to form a meeting
for this purpose. No attempt was made to maintain
the full number of 13 capital burgesses, and in
c. 1835 there were 8, of whom but 4 were resident
in Westbury. The borough court was presumably
the old portmote, last mentioned under that name
in 1599. (fn. 21) It had come to meet but once a year and
to conduct business that was only formal. A
steward of the borough, who until the 1830's was
also the steward of the capital manor, presided with
the mayor. A grand and petty jury were summoned.
The grand jury appointed a borough constable and a
number of inferior officers. (fn. 22) The constable executed warrants and summonses within the borough
and also within the tithing of the town. The other
officers were virtually without duties. The petty jury,
usually composed of inhabitants of the borough
only, presented nuisances and assessed fines, though
the fines were not enforced.
It is difficult to make a story out of materials so
scanty and disconnected. Certainly it seems as
though Westbury was on the way to developing a
conventional borough constitution by the reign of
Elizabeth I. But at no time is there proof of any
true autonomy. It was the lord of the manor who
collected the profits of markets and fairs, (fn. 23) he who
appointed to be steward and bailiff of the portmote
the steward and bailiff of his own manor court, (fn. 24) he
who appointed or acted as recorder in the 18th
century. In 1460 (fn. 25) and 1599 (fn. 26) the town prison was
his, and in the later year the guildhall and court
house also. In these circumstances it must be supposed that most of the town's business was conducted, as in any rural manor, in manorial courts, or
else by the parish officers.
Apart from the courts of the capital manor,
mention should be made here of the courts, called
'an assembly of tenants', that Thomas Phipps held
for his tenants in Chalford, Brook, and Westbury
Leigh. (fn. 27) This met, under the chairmanship of a
steward, in a house called Whitehall in Chalford,
which in 1899 still bore the inscription:
'Here is a stone stand in the wall
'To testify this is Whitehall
'I.M.H. 1704'
It was reputed at one time to have been used for
meetings of the local magistrates, and some cells
behind could still be seen. (fn. 28) Presumably the magistrates took over the building after the manorial
courts had ceased to sit and caused the cells to be
put up.
Until the end of the 19th century the government of the ancient parish presented a number of
peculiar problems. The parish comprised over
11,000 a. with a small urban community in the
centre, two fair-sized tithings, each with a church,
and a number of scattered rural hamlets. At the
end of the 17th century, when the surviving parish
records begin, poor relief for the whole parish was
administered by the Westbury vestry. (fn. 29) The vestry
was 'open', and there were at this date besides the
two churchwardens, four overseers of the poor.
Each overseer had a number of assistants, and was
allotted one of the divisions into which the parish
was split for purposes of poor relief. The divisions
were Westbury, Westbury Leigh, including Brook,
Dilton, including Chapmanslade, and Bratton, including Hawkeridge and Heywood. (fn. 30)
Dilton, and, it may be presumed, Bratton also, (fn. 31)
had vestries of their own. In 1689 Dilton had two
chapel-wardens. (fn. 32) In matters of poor relief the
function of the Dilton vestry was restricted to
nominating a number of persons as overseer for the
division, one of whom was then elected by the
Westbury vestry. Both Dilton and Bratton, however,
appear to have elected their own surveyors of the
highway. (fn. 33)
In 1652 the Vicar of Westbury was excused the
payment of rates in return for the use of three
houses in the churchyard for the poor. (fn. 34) The houses
were still in use at the end of the century and
in 1687 there was also a poorhouse at Westbury
Leigh for the use of the poor of that division. (fn. 35) In
1732 the vestry decided to buy a house at Westbury Leigh as a workhouse and to employ a salaried
master and mistress. (fn. 36) It is not known whether this
was done, but in 1769 a site at Gooseland was bought
for a workhouse. (fn. 37) Architectural evidence suggests
that this mid-18th-century workhouse may have
been incorporated in the Westbury Union Workhouse built on the same site in c. 1835. In 1687 the
vestry ordered that those receiving alms should
wear the badge of the parish on their shoulders, and
that alms in kind should be distributed monthly
from the parish church. (fn. 38)
In the late 17th, and throughout the 18th century, the vestry, although 'open', was apparently
dominated by a few of the wealthier inhabitants,
particularly the clothiers, who frequently held
office as churchwardens or overseers, appointing
deputies to discharge their duties for them. (fn. 39)
Partly in the hope of remedying this state of affairs,
statutory powers were obtained in 1786 for the
appointment of a salaried additional overseer. (fn. 40)
The churchwardens and overseers were to continue
to make and collect rates, but all money was to be
passed to the additional overseer, who was to have
full authority for the care of the poor. The first
appointment was not made until 1801, when a
committee was also set up to investigate the state
of the poor and the management of the workhouse. (fn. 41)
The early 19th century was a time of much unemployment in Westbury and the vestry was
obliged to concern itself with attempts to alleviate
the hardship and distress which abounded. (fn. 42) In
1801 it purchased boilers to make soup for the
poor and employed a woman to make it. (fn. 43) Two
years later the parish was divided into new
divisions for poor relief, each under the management of a committee, and various measures were
taken to provide employment. (fn. 44) The divisions on
this occasion were Westbury and Hawkeridge,
Bratton, Westbury Leigh with Dilton Marsh,
Shortstreet, and Chapmanslade.
Gradually the vestry began to assume wider
responsibilities. In 1814 it arranged for four women
to receive training as mid-wives. (fn. 45) In 1827 it employed a constable to feed the prisoners and to
clean and maintain the blindhouse. (fn. 46) This was presumably the prison under the Town Hall which in
1835 had recently been pulled down. (fn. 47) At that date
there were neither police officers nor public watchmen in the town. (fn. 48) In 1837 a committee was
formed to consider a scheme for lighting the town
by gas. This committee appointed five inspectors
and estimated that 46 lamps would be required and
£150 spent annually on lighting the town. (fn. 49) A town
fire brigade was first formed with 4 engines in 1861
after a disastrous fire had gutted one of the town's
cloth mills. (fn. 50)
In 1886, under the Municipal Corporations Act
of 1883, the corporation was dissolved, and the
corporate property, then much diminished, was
vested in the Town Trustees. (fn. 51) A parish council
was then formed, but no record of its activities has
survived. In 1894 Bratton and Dilton, and in 1896
Heywood, were made separate civil parishes, and in
1899 Westbury parish was created an urban district with a council of 12 members. (fn. 52) The council's
first meeting was held at the Laverton Institute on
4 October 1899 when besides a clerk and a treasurer,
a sanitary inspector, and a medical officer were
appointed. A finance and a general purposes committee were immediately elected and the decision
taken to adopt the former borough seal. (fn. 53) Among
the first matters to concern the council was the
supply of water to the urban district. Some houses
along Church Street and in the neighbourhood of
the Market Place already had a piped supply,
brought by force of gravity from the springs at the
foot of the downs to the east of the town. The
public baths in Church Street opened in 1887 were
supplied in this way from a spring at the Hollow,
and continued to be so supplied until well into the
second half of the 20th century. (fn. 54) In 1899 the Westbury and Dilton Marsh Joint Water Committee,
with representatives from the urban and the rural
districts, was formed to administer a water works
scheme already prepared. In 1901 a pumping
station along the Bratton road was opened with a
reservoir at the junction of New Town and Long
River. The Westbury and Dilton Marsh Joint
Water Committee continued to administer the
scheme until c. 1960 when its functions were taken
over by the West Wilts. Water Board. A second
pumping station was opened at Wellhead in 1929. (fn. 55)
Main water supply was extended only very
gradually to the entire area of the urban district,
and until quite late in the 20th century many residents remained dependent upon well-water.
Throughout the early years of the century there
were frequent reports of water pollution and contamination caused by the lack of any proper sewerage system or arrangements for rubbish disposal.
In 1907 much of the town's sewage was discharged
in its crude state into ditches on the north side of
the town and thence made its way into the River
Biss. Sewage from Westbury Leigh reached the
Biss from ditches near Penleigh. This state of
affairs was severely criticized by the Medical
Officer of Health for the County in 1907, who also
urged the council to introduce a rubbish disposal
service. Between 1907 and 1911 his criticisms and
recommendations were repeated several times, and
were endorsed by representations from the Local
Government Board. In 1909 the council was required to prepare a sewerage scheme and eventually
in 1911 this was done. But the cost, £13,000, was
considered by the council to be prohibitive. Nothing
had been done by the time war broke out in 1914,
and it was not until 1922 that a sewage works was
built for Westbury at Frogmore to the north-west
of the town. (fn. 56) In 1959–60 over £10,000 was spent
on modernizing these works. (fn. 57)
The council formed a special committee in 1900
to report on available sites for working mens' houses,
and in the following year plans were approved for
the building of a few such houses at Eden Vale.
Between the two World Wars 120 houses were
built by the council and since the Second World
War about 400 have been built. (fn. 58)
The town continued to be lit by gas until 1947
when electric street lighting was installed. After
1947 many improvements were made to the lighting
of all the streets in the town. (fn. 59)
The swimming baths in Church Street, presented
by W. H. Laverton in 1887, were taken over by
the council in 1900 and have since been administered by it. W. H. Laverton also presented a public
garden to the town to mark the Diamond Jubilee of
1897. But this was not used by the townspeople in
the way Laverton had intended, and in 1903 it was
closed. In 1938 a plot of ground called 'Grassacre'
was laid out by the council as a recreation ground. (fn. 60)
The Leighton cricket ground in Wellhead Lane,
which W. H. Laverton had made, and on which
many first-class matches have been played, was
leased by the council for 21 years in 1951. (fn. 61)
The Westbury and District Hospital, also called
the Cottage Hospital, was opened in Westbourne
Road in 1897, but moved in 1931 to a building
with 20 beds in Butts Road. (fn. 62) The Prideaux Hospital, with about 10 beds, was opened in Haynes
Road in 1928, but was closed in 1950. (fn. 63)
The first record of a postal service in Westbury is
in 1783 when Sarah Keevil was appointed postmistress. (fn. 64) In 1960 the post office was in Edward
Street and there were sub-post offices in Leigh Road
and at the Ham.
A court for the recovery of debts to the amount of
£5 was set up by statute in 1808 (fn. 65) to sit alternate
fortnights at Westbury and Warminster. It was
abolished as such by the County Courts Act of
1846. (fn. 66) Westbury was, however, the centre of a
county court district until shortly before the Second
World War when it was included within the Trowbridge county court district. (fn. 67)
SEAL.
The seal presented to the borough in 1597
was of silver, oval-shaped, 1¾ in. & time; 15/8 in. It bore
a shield, said to be of the town arms, quarterly or
and azure a cross quartered patonce fleury within
a bordure charged with twenty lioncels all counter-changed. The surrounding legend read:
Sigillum Maioris Et Burgensium De Westburie
The ivory handle, about 4½ in. long, was inscribed
'Matheus Ley Hoc Dedit Anno Domini 1597'. (fn. 68)
The seal was destroyed by a fire in the offices of
the urban district council in 1935. (fn. 69)