Vestry minutes

The ancient meeting of the parishioners to levy the church rate was named after the church vestry where they assembled.  Vestry meetings were either “open”, that is the meeting could be attended by all the ratepayers, or “closed”, where power had become concentrated in the hands of a number of local “worthies”.  Their major responsibilities were for the parish poor and parish roads.  The Poor Relief Act of 1819 was an adoptive act, which enabled open vestries to appoint a representative committee, with voting according to land ownership, and thus to establish a “select vestry” or poor law committee. 

This blog explores the select vestry meeting minute books for Sinnington, 1821-1828 [PR/SIT 15/5] and Marrick, 1819-1829 [PC/MAR 1/1].

Sinnington vestry minutes 1821-1828

The legislation was adopted by Sinnington, a township of 343 people, and the first page of the select vestry minute book records:

“At a Public Vestry held in the Parish Church, and from thence by adjournment in the School House of Sinnington in the said Riding on the seventh day of June 1821, the following persons were nominated and elected to be a Select Vestry for the said township of Sinnington agreeably to the Rules of the 59th G3 c.12 intitled “An Act to amend the Laws for the Relief of the Poor”

Pudsey Dawson                                             Robert Hood

William Stables                                             Robert Robinson

John Hartas                                                   William Bulman

Thomas Hartas                                              Charles Nawton

John Grunden                                                William Holmes

Cornelius Read                                              George Brown

The incumbent, churchwardens and overseer were ex officio members of the committee, which nominated a new select vestry of 12 for election every year.  Those elected were formally appointed by a Justice of the Peace.

The minute book records payments to the poor and details of their setting to work.  In June 1821, it was resolved that:

“George Walker in consequence of his wife’s confinement have a donation of 10s 6d

Mary Hebron be employed from house to house working 1 week for £20 per year sess“

And the following month that:

“John Bointon having been ill for 3 weeks of a Rhumatic Feaver have handed to him 25s and 8s per week untill his recovery or till our next meeting

The overseer shall pay for sundry articles of clothing for E. Wilson’s boy 18s 6d“

In April 1822 it was recorded that:

“Lancelot Simpson lately removed to this parish be employed by the Roadmasters and that he have 7s per load for breaking stones, the usual 3 horse cartload, and that the stones be so broken as to pass thro’ a ring of 3 inch diam[eter] amd that the Surveyor of the Roads provide himself with such ring for the future work on the roads.”

In November 1821, it was decided that in order to reduce the burden on the parish, each occupier of land should take one servant “who either is, or is likely to become, chargeable to the parish” for every £50 at which their land was valued.  Wages were to be 6s a week with board.  Those not allotted were to go from house to house. 

The system was not very popular.  In September 1822 it was resolved:

“That in consequence of several of the inhabitants refusing to take & give work to those men who go round by house row (& particularly when in regular turn) & in direct opposition to a former resolution of the Select Vestry, that henceforth a regular list be given by the Overseer with a space left for the dates of coming to, & leaving, any turn, which shall be signed by the parties with whom the men have served & that any individual refusing to receive or turning away the men so applying for work shall be compelled either to receive & employ them, or to pay them after the fixed rate of wages for the whole time which is due from them, but that no person shall be obliged to take a man out of turn.”

The method remained unpopular and in November 1823 it was amended to allow the ratepayers more freedom to employ the men they wanted:

“That the system adopted for the last two years with respect to alloting the men actually or likely to become chargeable to the parish be set aside and that the masters and men be at liberty to agree among themselves and that after such agreement a list be taken of the men not hired who upon application to the overseer for work will be sent round by houserow after the following scale viz. 1 day for every [blank] of the commishoners valluation among those farmers first who have not taken the chargable men for every £50 of the said valuation for the year round.  That [those] taking their full complement is more to be proportionally relieved and those who may be short taking a greater share of days in the house row list so as to make all equal and hired men quitting their services to be immediately replaced or the masters to have a proportionable number of days of the houserow men.”

The vestry were careful not to take on responsibility for the poor unnecessarily, but only for those who could legally claim settlement there.  Settlement could be gained by a variety of means including residence, apprenticeship and payment of the parish rate.  In April 1822 it was recorded:

“That Charles Jackson’s settlement at Sinnington being doubted, altho’ removed here by the Parish of Brompton, his examination be taken and the case be further considered by the next meeting of the Select Vestry.”

The following meeting placed Jackson to work on David Helme’s farm, so his settlement at Sinnington must have been accepted. Where Sinnington had paid money to paupers with legal settlement elsewhere, the vestry would attempt to reclaim the money.  In November 1826, the overseer was requested to write to Richmond parish to be reimbursed for money paid to J. Pickering’s daughter. The previous month, there is reference to money being paid to a pauper then living in Scarborough but presumably with legal settlement at Sinnington:

“That the overseer pay Hannah Temple of Scarborough for 29 weeks and that he write and inform the overseer of Scarbro’ that it is the judgement of our vestry that her weekly allowance should cease at the time specified above judging it very improper to countenance such a manner of living.”

No further explanation as to her “manner of living” is given.

In May 1822, a plan for building eight additional houses for the poor was approved and estimates for undertaking the work  were requested. The contract was awarded to a William Smith of Marton, who was paid 100 guineas in September of that year with more to follow. 

In April 1823, the new houses were allotted to Isabella Hebron, Thomas Sanderson, Jno. Pickering, Richard Dawson, Robert Ward, Robert Oldridge, Mary Trennum and John Bointon.

The select vestry also arranged for the apprenticeship of pauper children. For example, in 1822, John Wilson was bound to Jos. Snowden, shoemaker of Kirbymoorside and in 1826 the overseers were requested to look for a place as an apprentice for Robert Skelton’s son, James.

The energy expended by the Sinnington select vestry seems, according to Sidney and Beatrice Webb in English Local Government Vol. 1 : The Parish and the County (1906), to have been fairly typical of parishes all over the country. The optional clause of the 1819 Act enabling the establishment of such a vestry was adopted immediately by almost 2000 parishes, and within 10 years by nearly 1000 more.  Generally, the select vestries tightened up control over the overseers, overhauled the collection of the rates and adopted administrative reforms.  Enthusiasm was, however, short-lived and many select vestries did not survive for long. Overseers found the control of the committee irksome and the members found the fortnightly meetings too much. The total number of select vestries for England and Wales, which reached 2868 in 1828, had fallen to 2392 by 1832. Sinnington’s minute book ends in 1828 and it is not clear for how much longer the select vestry continued to meet.

Marrick vestry minutes 1819-1829

The Marrick vestry seems, like Sinnington, to have been very enthusiastic initially but again short-lived. The minute book dates from 1819-1829 and begins in exactly the same way as that of Sinnington, with a record of the names of those elected to form the select vestry.

PC/MAR 1/1 , Opening page of minute book, recording the names of those elected to form the select vestry, 8 November 1819

The first meeting was held in the school house on 18 October 1819 and the vestry moved swiftly about its business. Its first action was to reduce the amount of relief given to nine poor people and to refuse relief to three others. The refusals were on the grounds that one of the applicants had ‘constant work’, one had ‘a sufficient pension’ and one ‘had bread found him‘ but at the following meeting John Hawkin’s pension was reduced by is a week ‘on acc[oun]t of his wife being insolent at the meeting‘. Other reasons were looked for to deny relief. The meeting on 8 November 1819 resolved:

“Any person keeping a dog and receiving parochial relief to be struck of[f] the pension list”.

However, payments for relief were made. In May 1821 the vestry resolved:

“Bridget Burton and her 3 children to have 4s 6d per week on acc[oun]t of her husband being confined in Beverly House of Correction for poaching”.

And in July 1821, John Gladwin was:

“to have 2 pounds to enable him to take the benefit of sea bathing, he being in a poor state of health”.

PC/MAR 1/1 , Minutes of 8 November 1819 recording that “Any person keeping a dog and receiving parochial relief to be struck of[f] the pension list”.

One family that seems to have caused the vestry particular concern was the Pounder family. A Ralph Pounder was advanced 20 shillings on account of his government pension in February 1820. In December 1823, he left the parish abandoning his five children but the following month applied to the vestry for £1 to remove his family. The application was refused and it was decided that he should be proceeded against for neglect. Another Pounder, John, was examined about his family’s settlement in April 1820. His four children were all said to have been bound apprentice to tradesmen in Whitehaven. In June 1822, he was refused relief for being insolent at the meeting but he must have continued to bother the vestry for, in October 1882, it was:

“agreed to give John Pounder his pension in advance to Ladyday 1823 and he promisses not to appear at the vestry till that time”.

His branch of the Pounder family must have had links with both Marrick and Whitehaven. In August 1824, Bella Pounder applied for £6 to go to Whitehaven but was refused as the members of the vestry thought it too much. The following month she, her daughter Ann and child were given 25s ‘to carry them back to Whitehaven‘. At around the same time, Jane Pounder requested £6 to take her back to Whitehaven, but the vestry preferred to try to find her employment in Marrick. In May 1825, it was agreed to give Elizabeth Pounder of Whitehaven 15s to carry her home and, in August, Ann Pounder applied for something to carry her to Whitehaven and was given 25 shillings.

PC/MAR 1/1 Entries from the Marrick select vestry minute book relating to Bella Pounder’s application for £6 being refused, 9 August 1824 (left) and Thomas Pounder being sent £1, 12 December 1825 (right)

Even away from the parish there were concerns for the Pounders. In November 1825, the vestry learned that a Thomas Pounder was in distress at Trawden, near Colne in Lancashire, with his wife in a poor state of health. It was agreed to send 11s to the overseers of that place to give to him or not as they saw fit. A further £1 was sent in December and another £1 in the following April, when Thomas was said to be ‘under the doctor’s hands’. In May 1827, a Thomas Pounder in Burnley was refused money for his rent, but the vestry agreed to try to find him work if he returned to Marrick. Finally, in April 1829, Jacob Pounder was given 26s to start a weaving business in Colne, but the success or failure of the business is not recorded.