Chiddingstone Early Poor Law Accounts

CHIDDINGSTONE EARLY POOR LAW ACCOUNTS By JUNE GIBBONS ONE group of Kentish parishes to the south east of Sevenoaks are singular in having preserved thek early poor law accounts. Westerham, Leigh, Hever, Cowden and Chiddingstone ah possess accounts of overseers of the poor from the late sixteenth or early seventeenth centuries. It may be pure coincidence that the records have escaped destruction in this district or possibly the justices of the peace were more zealous here than elsewhere in enforcing the Ehzabethan poor laws. Of the five parishes, the Chiddingstone accounts are of the greatest interest. They contain a very good example of the quite rare accounts of coUectors for the poor. Though by the Act of 1551-2 for the provision of the rehef of the poor, coUectors were to be appointed in every parish, Chiddingstone is among the few parishes possessing any records of coUectors. The accounts form a series of entries in a volume of churchwardens' accounts and under the heading " Accounts of coUectors for the poor " they run continuously from 1565 to 1584. For every year there is a list of those contributing to the poor with the total amount received and a list of the poor who received relief. The number of contributors varies between 37 and 47, except in 1575 when the number drops to 26. In 1565 when the accounts begin, the amount coUected was £3 18s. lid., but this was apparently an over estimate of the needs of the poor. There was a comfortable balance over in most years and in 1575 the coUection was only £1 4s. 4d. 1570 was a quite exceptional year when £20 0s. 6d. was raised, but evidently this was for some special purpose not mentioned in the accounts as only £1 16s. 8d. was given to the poor in that year. The coUectors appear to have hmited thek duties to doling out smaU sums to the sick and needy and distributing gifts and bequests. There were no pensioners receiving regular weekly sums, though about five names appeared regularly in the lists of the poor for several years running. Nor are there any entries of chUdren being apprenticed or boarded out. There appear to have been from seven to twenty poor, and the payments they received varied considerably. In 1575 a total of only 4s. 4d. was distributed, while in 1584 it was £6 Is. lid. among five poor. From 1584-1598, no poor accounts exist. When the accounts of the overseers of the poor start in 1598, it is clear that poor relief was carried out on a much more ambitious scale. 193 CHIDDINGSTONE EARLY POOR LAW ACCOUNTS Two to four rates were levied every year and those paying rates were divided into " indweUers," people living in the parish and " outdweUers," people who owned land in the parish; the latter were rated at ld. an acre. The number of those paying rates is some indication of the size of Chiddingstone's population in the early seventeenth century: 1604 62 indweUers 45 outdweUers 1624 74 indweUers 44 outdweUers 1658 93 indweUers 53 outdweUers. Receipts and payments balance very closely and, unlike the earlier coUectors, the overseers seldom over-estimated thek needs. The amount coUected from rates between 1598 and 1630 varied between £11 and £26 10s. Od. 1605, 1614-1616, 1621 and 1623 are years when over £20 was paid to the poor and this was probably due to either bad harvests or local outbreaks of plague. From 1631 to 1639 rates averaged about £30 a year and at the start of the Civil War in 1640 there was a sharp rise to £43 lis. 8d. They rose again in 1643 to £63 10s. 7d. and in 1645 and 1646 to over £75 a year. This was the highest figure tUl 1659 when the rates were £77 5s. ld. In the intervening years they remained at between £40 and £55 a year. The figures given show a very simUar pattern of poor rehef to those of several London parishes, St. Benets Pauls Wharf among them. The economic crisis of 1621 was caused by a dechne in the cloth trade and Chiddingstone may have been affected by this. The rise in the amount paid for poor rehef in the 1630's was widespread throughout the country and was due partly to the rise in prices and partly to the vigorous efforts of the Privy Council to see that the statutes relating to the poor were enforced. The CivU War brought an increase in the number of poor in Chiddingstone and the big rise in rates show that the overseers had a serious problem to contend with. However, there was no breakdown in the administration of poor relief and they rendered thek accounts faithfuUy every year. The most interesting constructive efforts to deal with the problem of poverty occurred early in the seventeenth century, when the overseers tried to maintain a stock and buUd a house for the poor. There is very httle information about the house: in 1600 the overseers paid £1 5s. 6d. for repaks and in 1601 they collected £1 19s. 7d. for buUding a house for rehef of the poor. In the same year they paid £17 5s. 8d. for buUding the house, but there is no record of how they raised the rest of the money and this is the last mention of the house in the accounts. The attempt at providing a stock to set the able bodied poor to work was short hved. In 1599 the overseers held a stock of £3 8s. 2d., but by 1601 this had dwindled to £1 15s. 3d. A special rate for stock 194 CHIDDINGSTONE EARLY POOR LAW ACCOUNTS was levied from 1603 to 1605 but after that the account of the stock ends and the remainder appears to have been used up in casual payments to the poor. I t is impossible to make even a guess at the number of poor in any year. Each overseer made a list of every payment made and the same names occur many times in the list and sometimes in the hst of more than one overseer. The payments vary from 4d. to a poor vagrant to quite large sums for the support of chhdren and widows. From 1607 onwards, the overseers acted as trustees for the legacies of Streitfield and John Pellsatt of £2 12s. Od. a year. The accounts are stiU kept in the parish church. They are a valuable source for the social history of Chiddingstone and provide an almost continuous history of poor relief when such records are comparatively scarce. Chiddingstone appears to have been a model parish in carrying out the provisions of the Ehzabethan and Stuart Poor Laws. 195