The Parish Clerk Part 14

The following extracts will show the nature of the book and of the systematic record the good clerk kept of his expenditure. The only item about which there is some uncertainty is the amount "spent at Freeman's Coming from Visitation." Is it possible that he was so much excited or intoxicated that he could not remember?

"1737. Land tax to hon. Adenbrook 0. 0. 11 Acount What Mary Tunks as ad. Redy money 4/-, for a hapern 2/-, for caps 1/6 and for shoes 2/6, and for ye werk 6 d. Stokins and sues mendering 6 d, and for string 2 d, and for a Gound 3/-, and for ale for Hur father 2 d, for mending Gound 8 d, for stokens 10 d, for more Shuse strong 2/6, Shift mending and maken 5 d, for Hur mother 1/6, for a Shift 2/7."

To this day old Wednesbury natives say "hapern" for ap.r.o.n, and "sues"

for shoes.

"Sep. the 10th, 1745, then recd of Alex. Bunn the sum of six pounds for one year's rent due at Midsmar.

Last past Ellin Moris. Wm. Selvester and his man the first wick 14/-. Mr. Butler and Gilbut Wrigh, church wardens for the year 1741, due to Alex Bunn as under. Ringing for the Visitation 2/-, spent at Roshall, going to the visitation 1/6-, spent at Henery Rutoll 1/-, paid at Litchfield to the Horsbox (?) 6 d, Wm. Aston Had Ale at my House 6 d, for Micklmas Supeles washing and lining 1/8, for Ringing for the 11th of October 5/-, for Ringing for the 30th of October 5/-, for half year's wages Due June ye 24 1 12 s. 6.

Ringing for the 5th November, for washing the Supelis and Lining and Bread at Chrsmus 1/3, for Easter Supelis washing and Lining and Bread 1/8, for Joyle for the Clock and Bells 2/6, for Leader for the 4th Bell Clapper 5 d, Ringing for the 23rd of April 5/-, for making the Levy 2/-, for a hors to Lichfield 11/6, pd John Stack going to Dudley 2 times for the Clockman 1/-.

For a monthly (?) meeting to Ralph Momford Sep. the 15th 2/-, Spent at freeman's Coming from the Visitation-----"[64]

[Footnote 64: _Olden Wednesbury_, by F.W. Hackwood, who kindly sent me this information.]

But we have grievous things to record with regard to the clerks and the registers, not that they were to blame so much as the proper custodians, who neglected their duties and left these precious books in the hands of ignorant clerks to be preserved in poor overcrowded cottages. But the parish clerks sinned grievously. One Phillips, clerk of Lambeth parish, ran away with the register book, so Francis Sadler tells us in his curious book, _The Exaction and Imposition of Parish Fees Discovered_, published in 1738, "whereby the parish became great sufferers; and in such a case no person that is fifty years old, and born in the parish, can have a transcript of the Register to prove themselves heir to an estate." Moreover, Master Sadler, who was very severe on parish clerks, tells of the iniquities of the Battersea clerk who used to register boys for girls and girls for boys, and not one-half of the register book, in his time, was correct and authentic, as it ought to be.

What shall be said of the carelessness of an inc.u.mbent who allowed the register to be kept by the clerk in his poor cottage? When a gentleman called to obtain an extract from the book, the clerk produced the valuable tome from a drawer in an old table, where it was reposing with a ma.s.s of rubbish. Another old parchment register was discovered in a cottage in a Northamptonshire parish, some of the pages of which were tacked together as a covering for the tester of a bedstead. The clerk in another parish followed the calling of a tailor, and found the old register book useful for the purpose of providing himself with measures.

With this object he cut out sixteen leaves of the old book, which he regarded in the light of waste paper.

A gentleman on one occasion visited a church in order to examine the registers of an Ess.e.x parish. He found the record for which he was searching, and asked the clerk to make the extract for him.

Unfortunately this official had no ink or paper at hand with which to copy out the entry, and casually observed:

"Oh, you may as well have the leaf as it is," and without any hesitation took out his pocket-knife, cut out the leaf and gave the gentleman the two entire pages[65].

[Footnote 65: _History of Parish Registers_, by Burn; _Social Life as told by Parish Registers_, by T.F. Thiselton-Dyer, p. 2.]

Another scandalous case was that of the clerk who combined his ecclesiastical duties with those of the village grocer. The pages of the parish register he found most useful for wrapping up his goods for his customers. He was, however, no worse than the curate's wife, who ought to have known better, and who used the leaves of the registers for making her husband's kettle-holders.

What shall be said for the guardians of the church doc.u.ments of Blythburgh, Suffolk? The parish chest preserved in the church was at one time full of valuable doc.u.ments in addition to very complete registers.

So Suckling, the historian of Suffolk, reported. Alas! these have nearly all disappeared. Scarcely anything remains of the earliest volume of the register which concludes with the end of the seventeenth century, and the old deeds have gone also. How could this terrible loss have occurred? It appears that a parish clerk, "in showing this fine old church to visitors, presented those curious in old papers and autographs with a leaf from the register, or some other doc.u.ment, as a memento of their visit[66]."

[Footnote 66: _Social Life as told by Parish Registers_; also _Standard_, 8 Jan., 1880.]

Another clerk was extremely popular with the old ladies of the village, and used to cut out the parchment leaves of the registers and present them to his old lady friends for wrapping their knitting pins. He was also the village schoolmaster, as many of his predecessors had been, but this wretch used to cover the backs of his pupil's lesson-books with leaves of parchment taken from the parish chest. Another clerk found the leaves of the registers very useful for "singeing a goose."

The value of old registers for proving t.i.tles to estates and other property is of course inestimable. Sometimes incomes of thousands of pounds depend upon a little entry in one of these old books, and it is terrible to think of the jeopardy in which they stand when they rest in the custody of a careless clerk or apathetic vicar.

The present writer owes much to the faithful care of a good clerk, who guarded well the registers of a defunct City church of London. My father was endeavouring to prove his t.i.tle to an estate in the north country, and had to obtain the certificates of the births, deaths, and marriages of the family during about a century. One wedding could not be proved.

Report stated that it had been a runaway marriage, and that the bride and bridegroom had fled to London to be married in a City church. My father casually heard of the name of some church where it was thought that the wedding might have taken place. He wrote to the authorities of that church. It had, however, ceased to exist. The church had disappeared, but the old clerk was alive and knew where the books were.

He searched, and found the missing register, and the chain of evidence was complete and the t.i.tle to the property fully established, which was confirmed after much troublesome litigation by the Court of Chancery.

Sometimes litigants have sought to remove troublesome entries in those invaluable books which record with equal impartiality the entrance into the world and the departure from it of peer or peasant. And in such dramas the clerk frequently appears. The old man has to be bribed or cajoled to allow the books to be tampered with. A stranger arrives one evening at Rochester, and demands of the clerk to be shown the registers. The stranger finds the entry upon which much depends. In its present form it does not support his case. It must be altered in order to meet his requirements. The clerk hovers about the vestry, alert, vigilant. He must be got rid of. The stranger proposes various inducements; the temptation of a comfortable seat in a cosy corner of the nearest inn, a stimulating gla.s.s, but all in vain. There is something suspicious about the stranger's looks and manners; so the clerk thinks. He sticks to his elbow like a leech, and nothing can shake him off. At length the stranger offers the poor clerk a goodly bribe if only he will help him to alter a few words in that all-important register. I am not sure whether the clerk yielded to the temptation.

There was a still more dramatic scene in the old vestry of Lainston Church, where a few years previously a Miss Chudleigh had been married to Lieutenant Hervey. This young lady, who was not remarkable for her virtue, arrived one day at the church accompanied by a fascinating friend who, while Mrs. Hervey examined the register, exercised her blandishments on the clerk. She expressed much interest in the church, and asked him endless questions about its architecture, the state of his health, his family, his duties; and while this little by-play was proceeding Mrs. Hervey was carefully and noiselessly cutting out the page in the register which contained the entry of her marriage. Having removed the tell-tale page she hastily closed the book, summoned her fascinating friend, and hastened back to London. The clerk, still thinking of the beautiful lady who had been so friendly and given him such a handsome present, locked the safe, and never discovered the theft. But time brought its revenge. Lieutenant Hervey succeeded unexpectedly to the t.i.tle of the earldom of Bristol. His wife was overcome with remorse. By her foolish scheme she had sacrificed a coronet. That missing paper must be restored; and so the lady pays another visit to Lainston Church, on this occasion in the company of a lawyer. The old clerk unlocks again the parish chest. The books are again produced; confession is made of the former theft; the lawyer looks threateningly at the clerk, and tells him that if it should ever be discovered he will suffer as an accomplice; and then, with the promise of a substantial bribe, the clerk consents to give his aid. The missing paper is produced and deftly inserted in its former place in the book, and Miss Chudleigh becomes the Countess of Bristol. It is a curious story, but it has the merit of being true. Many strange romances are bound up within the stained and battered parchment covers of an old register.

Sometimes the clerk seems to have recorded in the register book some entries which scarcely relate to ecclesiastical usages or spiritual concerns. Agreements or bargains were inserted occasionally, and the fact that it was recorded in the church books testified to the binding nature of the transaction. Thus in the book of St. Mary Magdalene, Cambridge, in the year 1692, it is announced that Thomas Smith promises to supply John Wingate "with hatts for twenty shillings the yeare during life." Mr. Thiselton-Dyer, who records this transaction in his book on _Social Life as told by Parish Registers_, conjectures with evident truth that the aforenamed men made this bargain at an ale-house, and the parish clerk, being present, undertook to register the agreement.

A most remarkable clerk lived at Grafton Underwood in the eighteenth century, one Thomas Carley, who was born in that village in 1755, having no hands and one deformed leg. Notwithstanding that nature seemed to have deprived him of all means of manual labour, he rose to the position of parish schoolmaster and parish clerk. He contrived a pair of leather rings, into which he thrust the stumps of his arms, which ended at the elbow, and with the aid of these he held a pen, ruler, knife and fork, etc. The register books of the parish show admirable specimens of his wonderful writing, and I have in my possession a tracing made by Mr.

Wise, of Weekley, from the label fixed inside the cover of one of the large folio Prayer Books which used to be in the Duke of Buccleuch's pew before the church was restored, and were then removed to Boughton House. These books contain many beautifully written papers, chiefly supplying lost ones from the Psalms. The writing is simply like copper-plate engraving. In the British Museum, amongst the "additional MSS." is an interleaved edition of Bridge's _History of Northamptonshire_, bound in five volumes. In the fourth volume, under the account of Grafton Underwood, some particulars have been inserted of the life of this extraordinary man, with a water-colour portrait of him taken by one of his pupils, E. Bradley. There is also a specimen of his writing, the Lord's Prayer inscribed within a circle about the size of a shilling. There is also in existence "a mariner's compa.s.s," most accurately drawn by him. He died in 1823.

CHAPTER XII

THE CLERK AS A POET

The parish clerk, skilled in psalmody, has sometimes shown evidences of true poetic feeling. The divine afflatus has occasionally inspired in him some fine thoughts and graceful fancies. His race has produced many writers of terrible doggerel of the monumental cla.s.s of poetry; but far removed from these there have been some who have composed fine hymns and sweet verse.

An obscure hymn-writer, whose verses have been sung in all parts of the world, was Thomas Bilby, parish clerk of St. Mary's Church, Islington, between the years 1842 and 1872. He was the parish schoolmaster also, and thus maintained the traditions of his office handed down from mediaeval times. Before the days of School Boards it was not unusual for the clerk to teach the children of the working cla.s.ses the three R's and religious knowledge, charging a fee of twopence per week for each child.

Mrs. Mary Strathern has kindly sent me the following account of the church wherein Thomas Bilby served as clerk, and of the famous hymn which he wrote.

The church of St. Mary's, Islington, was not internally a thing of beauty. It was square; it had no chancel; the walls were covered with monuments and tablets to the praise and glory of departed parishioners.

On three sides it had a wide gallery, the west end of which contained the organ, with the Royal Arms as large as life in front. On either side below the galleries were double rows of high pews, and down the centre pa.s.sage a row of open benches for the poor. Between these benches and the altar, completely hiding the altar from the congregation, stood a huge "three-decker." The pulpit, on a level with the galleries, was reached by a staircase at the back; below that was "the reading desk,"

from which the curate said the prayers; and below that again, a smaller desk, where, Sunday after Sunday, for thirty years, T. Bilby, parish clerk and schoolmaster, gave out the hymns, read the notices, and published the banns of marriage. He was short and stout; his hair was white; he wore a black gown with deep velvet collar, ornamented with many ta.s.sels and fringes; and he carried a staff of office.

It was a great missionary parish. The vicar, Daniel Wilson, was a son of that well-known Daniel Wilson, sometime vicar of Islington, and afterwards Bishop of Calcutta. The Church Missionary College, where many young missionaries sent out by the Church Missionary Society are trained, stood in our midst; and it was within St. Mary's Church the writer saw the venerable Bishop Crowther, of the Niger, ordain his own son deacon. Mr. Bilby had at one time been a catechist and schoolmaster in Sierra Leone, and was full of interesting stories of the mission work amongst the freed slaves in that settlement. He had a magic lantern, with many views of Africa, and of the churches and schools in the mission fields, and often gave missionary lectures to the school children. It was on one of these occasions, when he had been telling us about his work abroad, and how he soon got to know when a black boy had a dirty face, that he said: "While I was in Africa, I composed a hymn, and taught the black children to sing it; and now there is not a Christian school in any part of the world where my hymn is not known and sung. I will begin it now, and you will all sing it with me." Then the old man began:

"Here we suffer grief and pain."

Immediately every child in the room took it up, and sang with might and main:

"Here we meet to part again; In heaven we part no more."

We had always thought the familiar words were as old as the Bible itself, and could scarcely believe they had been written by our own old friend.

Soon after that memorable night, the old man began to get feeble; his place in the church and schools was frequently filled by "Young Bilby,"

as he was familiarly called; and in 1872, aged seventy-eight, the old parish clerk was gathered to his fathers, and his son reigned in his stead.

The other day a copy of a Presbyterian hymn-book found its way into my house, and there I found "Here we suffer grief and pain." I turned up the index which gives the names of authors, wondering if the compilers knew anything of the source from whence it came, and found the name "Bilby"; but who "Bilby" was, and where he lived, is known to very few outside the parish, where the name is a household word, for Mr. Bilby's son is still the parish clerk of St. Mary, Islington, and through him we learn that his father composed the _tune_ as well as the words of "Here we suffer grief and pain."

As the hymn is not included in _Hymns Ancient and Modern_ or some other well-known collection, perhaps it will be well to print the first two verses. It is published in John Curwen's _The Child's Own Hymn Book_:

"Here we suffer grief and pain; Here we meet to part again: In heaven we part no more.

O! that will be joyful, Joyful, joyful, joyful, O! that will be joyful!

When we meet to part no more!

"All who love the Lord below, When they die to heaven will go, And sing with saints above.

O! that," etc.

A poet of a different school was Robert Story, schoolmaster and parish clerk of Gargrave, Yorkshire. He was born at Wark, Northumberland, in 1795, but migrated to Gargrave in 1820, where he remained twenty years.

Then he obtained the situation of a clerk in the Audit Office, Somerset House, at a salary of 90 a year, which he held till his death in 1860.

His volume of poems, ent.i.tled _Songs and Lyrical Poems_, contains some charming verse. He wrote a pathetic poem on the death of the son of a gentleman at Malham, killed while bird-nesting on the rocks of Cam Scar.

Another poem, _The Danish Camp_, tells of the visit of King Alfred to the stronghold of his foes, and has some pretty lines. "O, love has a favourite scene for roaming," is a tender little poem. The following example of his verse is of a humorous and festive type. It is taken from a volume of his productions, ent.i.tled _The Magic Fountain, and Other Poems_, published in 1829:

"Learn next that I am parish clerk: A n.o.ble office, by St. Mark!

It brings me in six guineas clear, Besides _et caeteras_ every year.

I waive my Sunday duty, when I give the solemn deep Amen; Exalted then to breathe aloud The heart-devotion of the crowd.

But oh, the fun! when Christmas chimes Have ushered in the festal times, And sent the clerk and s.e.xton round To pledge their friends in draughts profound, And keep on foot the good old plan, As only clerk and s.e.xton can!