Economy
The continuing economic decline of the town, caused largely by a falling off in
the wool and cloth trades, led Leland to remark that 'there was good cloth making
at Beverley but that is now much decayed'. (fn. 37) The decline was quickened by the
suppression of St. John's college. When in 1599 Beverley was discharged from
payment of the fifteenth and tenth, the Crown acknowledged the poverty into
which the town had fallen. Perhaps with some exaggeration, 400 houses were said
to be decayed and uninhabited, many poor and needy unemployed, costing the
town £105 a year for their relief, and 80 orphans maintained at the town's expense.
The former wealth of Beverley was said to have depended on the traffic of
merchants and clothiers, and the college was recalled as having maintained and
relieved many inhabitants, both laymen and clerics. (fn. 38)
Some oversea and coasting trade was still pursued by Beverley merchants.
George Green was licensed in 1534 to export butter and cheese and import wine
and woad, (fn. 39) and Beverley ships, among them the John and the Trinity, carried
corn to Scotland in the 1530s and 1540s. (fn. 40) For a time Beverley was still visited by
Easterling merchants from the Baltic. A dispute with them was heard in London
in 1520-1, and the dyers' orders of 1529 referred to the finishing of cloths belonging
to the Easterlings, who were said to be in the town from May Day to St. Laurence's
Day (probably 10 Aug.). (fn. 41) A few foreigners apparently settled in the town, men
like Nicholas Lowe, alien, and Lambert Williamson, Dutchman, who were admitted
as burgesses in 1565-6 and 1567-8 respectively. (fn. 42)
For the conduct of waterborne trade the town was at pains to maintain its right
of passage along the river Hull, for which an annual payment continued to be
made to the lord of Cottingham. (fn. 43) Problems caused by a bridge built over the river
at Hull in 1541 were removed by an award in 1559 whereby Hull undertook to
raise a leaf of the bridge to allow boats upstream. (fn. 44) At least once, c. 1530, Beverley
also resisted attempts by Hull to take tolls on the goods of Beverley burgesses
using the river. (fn. 45) Coal, corn, salt, and wine were among the goods carried between
the two towns by common carriers and watermen. (fn. 46)
For its prosperity Beverley became increasingly dependent on the trade of its
markets, and much business was done with Londoners. About 1540 three Beverley
men bought goods from a London mercer and another bought wine in Beverley
from a Londoner; a little later a Beverley merchant sold alum, flax, and soap to a
London tallow-chandler. (fn. 47) Trading connexions between the towns are reflected in
the wills of two London drapers who died in 1560: Thomas Whipp asked to be
buried in St. Mary's church at Beverley and made bequests to the poor of the
town, and Richard Ferrand sought burial in the minster and left to his wife the
house which he leased in Beverley. (fn. 48) At least by the 1560s Londoners attended the
Cross fair, which attracted people from many parts of the north of England. (fn. 49)
The leading of Londoners' wares from the river and the beck was let, producing
the modest sum of up to £5 a year from the 1570s. (fn. 50) The tolls on goods sold at the
various markets and fairs were held by the town, on lease from the archbishop in
the earlier 16th century and by grant from the Crown from 1555. (fn. 51) Receipts from
tolls and stallage averaged nearly £15 a year from the 1540s, reached £18 in the
early 1570s, and later usually exceeded £20. (fn. 52)
The occupations of townsmen are indicated by admissions to the freedom.
Burgesses were admitted by patrimony without payment, or after serving an
apprenticeship on payment of £1, or, if strangers, on payment of a fine often of
£1 or £2 but increased in the 1590s. (fn. 53) The minute books suggest that before
incorporation apprenticeship was much the most common method of enfranchisement. From 1558 to 1574 as many as 322 burgesses were admitted by apprenticeship
and only 93 by patrimony. In five years between 1576 and 1583, however, only 20
were admitted by apprenticeship, 42 by patrimony, and 24 by fine, with one not
stated. (fn. 54) Most admissions by apprenticeship or fine, but not those by patrimony,
were also included in the town accounts: in 24 years scattered throughout the
century 359 admissions were recorded, an average of about 15 a year. (fn. 55)
Of the 506 admissions in the 21 years covered by the minute books, (fn. 56) nearly 21
per cent were in the manufacturing trades. The 30 textile workers included 17
weavers and 9 in the finishing trades, 36 of the 47 in the leather trades were
tanners, and there were 29 metal workers. Another 8 per cent were in the
distributive trades, the 40 admissions including 17 drapers and 21 merchants and
mercers, and 20 admissions, mainly of watermen, were made of men in the shipping
trades. The basic needs of the town were met by the building, clothing, and food
and drink trades, which had 44, 105, and 50 admissions respectively, some 39 per
cent all told. The building workers included 23 carpenters and 14 tilers; there were
41 glovers, 34 tailors, and 24 shoemakers; and among those in victualling were 16
bakers and 13 butchers. Miscellaneous occupations numbered 127, including 34
labourers and 59 gentlemen and yeomen, and a handful of burgesses had no
occupation stated. Few husbandmen were admitted, but the common pastures and
the closes around the town allowed many burgesses to have some interest in
agriculture.
Brickmaking was carried on at a kiln near the beck. (fn. 57) In 1563-4 overseers of the
workmen there were appointed, (fn. 58) and in 1573-4 the town lent a tiler £20 to help
him work the kiln. (fn. 59) Only one miller is recorded in the admissions of burgesses,
but some bakers had their own horse mills. (fn. 60) Milling was still carried on at the
manorial water mills, but by the late 16th century the corporation had a windmill,
probably on Westwood, (fn. 61) there was another near Grovehill, and there may still
have been a windmill in Norwood. (fn. 62) The occurrence of a few shipwrights among
the new burgesses suggests that boats may have been made or repaired at Beverley.
In the 1490s there had still been c. 25 guilds or crafts, but further amalgamations
took place in the 16th century. The remaining crafts, of which there were 17
principal ones and a few others mentioned only occasionally, were the bakers;
bowyers, fletchers, and coopers; brewers and saddlers; bricklayers or tilers;
butchers; carpenters or wrights; cordwainers or shoemakers; drapers; dyers and
barbers; fishermen; glovers; merchants and mercers; minstrels; pewterers; smiths;
tailors; tanners; walkers, hatters, cappers, and oatmealmakers; watermen; and
weavers. (fn. 63) The dyers and barbers, who had amalgamated by 1572, (fn. 64) were unlikely
partners who presumably sought advantages other than craft regulation. By 1596
the bowyers, fletchers, and coopers had amalgamated with the carpenters, where
they joined 16 other kinds of woodworker. (fn. 65) Similarly, surgeons and toothpullers belonged to the dyers and barbers; armourers, cutlers, 'swordslipers', and
hardwaremen belonged to the smiths; and curriers and jerkin makers belonged to
the cordwainers. (fn. 66)
Most of the crafts were governed by an alderman or warden, 2 stewards, and 2
searchers, but the shoemakers in 1542 had two aldermen, one elected by the
masters and the other by the journeymen. (fn. 67) The names of brethren consenting to
the ordinances reveal as many as 22 bakers and 22 tanners in 1596, c. 15 cordwainers
between 1518 and 1563, 14 bricklayers and 14 carpenters in 1596, at least 14
merchants in 1502 and 1582, 11 weavers in 1596, 6 dyers in 1529, and 5 glovers
in 1596. Seven walkers, hatters, and cappers and 7 oatmealmakers approved the
orders of the amalgamated craft in 1572. (fn. 68) The survival of 6 sets of ordinances
from 1572 and 11 from 1596 suggests that concerted action by the crafts was
sometimes called for, presumably by the town's governors. (fn. 69) The crafts were at
pains to enforce apprenticeship and the payment of 'upsets' by those who became
brethren and annual 'contributions' by those who did not. Attempts were made to
prevent members of one craft from doing work more appropriate to another.
Demarcation was evidently difficult between the drapers and others involved in
the processing and sale of cloth and the making of clothes, (fn. 70) and an acrimonious
dispute took place early in the century over the payment of contributions by the
carpenters to the bowyers, fletchers, and coopers for making items which the
carpenters successfully claimed that their rivals were incapable of producing. (fn. 71)
Searchers were occasionally given authority outside their own craft; in 1560, for
example, the drapers' and tailors' searchers were empowered to examine the goods
of each other's members in the market. (fn. 72) At least in the case of the tanners in 1596
the right of search extended to the outlying townships, (fn. 73) and in 1501 all fishermen
in the liberties were ordered to pay contributions to the shipmen's craft. (fn. 74) In the
1570s the bakers even imposed fines on men living beyond the liberties and exacted
a contribution from a baker of Bentley, in Rowley. (fn. 75) The ceremonial and social
aspects of guild life were less in evidence in the ordinances than they had been in
the Middle Ages, but there were still provisions regarding dress. In 1569-70, when
craft members were said to be 'divided in sundry colours within themselves', the
governors ordered that each craft should acquire new gowns, all of the same
colour. (fn. 76)