the Church with a third of "the town granted by Earl Roger, with St. Mary of Lancaster and certain lands, in 1094, to the Abbey of Séez, near Alençon, in Normandy, of which he was founder," and under which it was held until the dissolution of alien priories in 1414.

2

Heysham is mentioned in many old charters, in the Valor, or Taxation of the only English Pope, Adrian Brakespeare, Nicholas IV., in 1291.3, Registers of alien priories are uncommon, but in a very beautiful Register of Lancaster Priory in the British Museum," "Carta de Hesham," occurs in its lists of charters.

66

In an Inspeximus, or Confirmatory Charter of the fifteenth year of Richard II., Hessehn cum tertia parte totius villa" is again referred to, under the gift of Roger of Poictou to Séez. In the reign of Henry V., when the Church lands in England held by foreign priories were re-annexed and bestowed on English foundations, the Abbey of Syon, in Middlesex, was endowed with Lancaster and Heysham, of which it held possession until the general dissolution of monastic foundations under Henry VIII.

The patronage of the Rectory of Heysham iş stated to have been occasionally exercised by the Crown even before it was severed from Séez. Since the dissolution it has been sometimes in the Crown, more usually in private hands. The presentations and institutions of the rectors appear in the Episcopal Registers of Chester from 1568, and are given in

1 See "Monasticon Anglicanum," vi. 997. 66 'Séez St. Martin de Sagio," edition by Caley, Sir Henry Ellis, and Bandinel.

2 Several Deeds in Madox's "Formulare Anglicanum," pp. 52, 53, 100, et alia.

Taxat. P. Nicholas IV., pp. 307, 309, 328, 329.

4 Plac. de Quo Warr., pp. 386, 387; Abbrev. Plac., p. 110.

5 British Museum, Harleian MSS. 3764.

Register of Alien Cells, quoted Whitaker's "Richmondshire,"

236, 237; also see Aungier's "History of Syon Abbey."

1

full in Harland's edition of Baines' "History of the County Palatine of Lancaster." There is an interesting reference in Kuerden's MS. History of Lanca shire to a charter granting "an Hospitium for the use of pilgrims resorting to St. Patrick's Chapel at Heysham." Where the hospice was is not stated, possibly in Lancaster. Dr. Kuerden, who wrote about the end of 1600, and whose valuable collections of material for history are partly in the Chetham Library in Manchester, partly in the Heralds' College in London, conjectures that the chapel was unnoticed amongst the dissolved chantries from being entirely supported by the oblations of pilgrims, and therefore presenting no object to the Commissioners of Survey.

A grant of land, of which the deed is amongst the Duchy of Lancaster Records, 1274-1286, from Adam de Hesayn, was held by the tenure of rendering yearly one arrow on St. Patrick's Day; and the long tongue of low, jagged rock stretching out into the bay below the Church bears the name of St. Patrick's Skier, the sharp edged or divided rock, the curious old Norwegian or Icelandic word linking us both with the northern invaders and settlers who left traces of their Norse tongue in so many sea-places, and with the famous Saint who was wrecked, so tradition has it, under the, then, lonely little headland.

The earliest existing book of Parish Registers begins in 1658, too late a date for anything of remarkable interest, beyond the recurrence of still familiar local names, in a parish which was, until

1 Dr. Kuerden's MSS., Chetham Library, Manchester, I vol. folio, p. 535; 1 vol. quarto, p. 674 (transcribed in same library by John Palmer in six vols.). Several volumes in the Heralds' College, London, c. 1690.

2 Duchy of Lancaster Grants in Boxes, Cart. Miscell., Box B., No. 26. On general subject, see also papers on Lancaster meeting of Royal Archæolog. in Journals, December 1898, March 1899.

L

recently, almost isolated and little known. Some of the entries of sums collected by King's Letters, as the custom was, in Church, strike us now as very curious applications of charitable offerings-“ collected by the Churchwardens and Overseers of this Parish, the first day of Aprill anno 1661, the sum of four shillings and sixpence for the Children and inhabitants of Saint Bartholomew and Saint Bennet within the Citty of London." In the same month and year "towards the reliefe of Thomas Bury (? not very legible) of Horncastle in the county of Lincoln-Gent."-"for the rebuilding of St. Mary's Church, in Scarborough, one shilling"-in 1662, "for the relief of the poore Protestants of the Dukedom of Lithuania, ten shillings and sevenpence"-"for six families in St. Martin's in the Fields, by fire, under the hand and seal of George (Hall) Bishop of Chester, published the 9th day of November, 1661, being the Lords Day, after the first Lesson, by William Ward, Parson of Heasham."

The sepulchral stone of the said parson already referred to as in the chancel is very quaint in arrangement and spelling:

1670Octobe-I

WILLIAM WARD-Pas

tor of th

is Church

About 30
Years-e

xpecteth

hear a re

currect

ion.

CHESTER AND LIVERPOOL IN THE

PATENT ROLLS OF RICHARD II.

AND THE

LANCASTRIAN

YORKIST KINGS

AND

THE

By J. H. Lumby, B.A.

Read 28th January 1904

HE value of the series of Patent Rolls now in course of publication lies in the reflection. they give of the events of their period which affected in a more or less special degree the progress of local history. From them may be gleaned particular applications of general statutes, momentous communications from sovereign to subject, choice gems of biography which delight the genealogist and pedigree-seeker. The part taken in military, civil, and religious life by obscure individuals, men and women of no greater pre-eminence, prominence, or importance than you and I have attained, by humble burgesses of small towns, by honest tradesmen or by retiring nuns, no less than the glorious or inglorious lives of the leaders and law-makers of all branches of service, find their place in the Letters Patent. Of great value, too, is the light thrown upon municipal organisation, the progress or decay of corporate unities, their duties, their ideals, their attainments. To the student who has already gained some knowledge of the history of his district the Patent Rolls have most to tell, and it is with a view of enlarging rather than of

supplementing the history of Chester and Liverpool during the Lancastrian-Yorkist times that the following brief notes have been taken from that series of records.

Chester county by virtue of its position as regnum in regno, gained by its situation on the Welsh Marches, is specially prominent in the Patent Rolls of Richard II. Its acquisition by Henry III. had removed the danger of a possible revolt by a powerful Earl, whose adherence considerably strengthened the power of the King; while the revenues of the Earldom formed a valuable asset in the Royal possessions. Each successive sovereign assiduously sought the goodwill and loyalty of its people, and Chester has always been noted for its love to the Crown. Richard himself raised it to the dignity of a Principality ob amorem populi, and Henry IV.'s first step towards the throne was to get possession of the city. It was partly with a view, no doubt, of fostering loyalty that the heir-apparent as Earl of Chester spent much of his time in the Castle, and, on his succession, took care to ratify the grants and rewards he had made during his Earldom. In fact, the great number of grants made to loyal subjects who had given good proof of their fidelity by long and arduous service to the Crown, shows that the value of the Earldom in the eyes of the King rested, in part, in the means it gave him of rewarding deserving subjects. These grants are occasionally worthy of note. 9 R. II., ii. In 1385, Joan de Mohun, Lady of Dunster, was granted the manor and hundred of Maxfeld

457.

Macclesfield) for good service to the King and Queen. This grant was equivalent to £100 per annum, which Lady Joan had previously taken 5 R. II., i. from the stannary of Devon and Cornwall. The office of hayward of Frodsham was granted to

615.